


Searching for Purpose

by SittingInSilence



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Everyone lives, Gen, Guaranteed happy ending, Mental Health Issues, Possibly Triggering, Suicidal thoughts and actions, no one dies, overcoming depression, relationships are not the focus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-16
Updated: 2015-02-24
Packaged: 2018-02-21 08:38:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 33
Words: 39,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2461877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SittingInSilence/pseuds/SittingInSilence
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tyler was sad. He was hurt, confused, angry, and scared, too, but most of all, he was sad. He didn't know if it was because he had been stuck in the same town for his entire life or it it was something a bit more serious, but that little uncertainty didn't stop him from applying to colleges all throughout the country and going to the one the furthest away from where he grew up. It wasn't the best choice he had made in his life, but suddenly there's this kid that shows up who dyes his hair a different color almost every month, and maybe, just maybe, he's the cure to Tyler's, well, whatever it is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Tiny Penguins

Tyler stared at the car in front of him. It was full to the top with boxes and bags, containing almost everything from his old bedroom. His family stood behind him, waiting for the moment he climbed into his car and drove off. He was pretty sure his mother was crying, but the sniffles might have also belonged to his dad. Tyler could never tell. It might have been both of them anyways.

“Tyler, sweetie,” his mom called to him from over his shoulder. Tyler turned around and walked over to her. Immediately her arms wrapped around him and it was clear that she had no intention of letting him go. “You don’t have to go,” she mumbled into his shoulder.

Tyler hugged back, not really wanting to at that exact moment, but knowing it’s what his mother needed. “I want to, though, Mom. I need to,” he whispered.

Slowly she nodded her head and let him go. As soon as he was free from her embraced his dad pulled him into another hug.

“Be careful, kid. I don’t want to get a call saying that you landed yourself in the hospital because you thought you could climb something.”

Tyler forced a smile. His dad thought it was real, as did the rest of his family. He hadn’t told them his real reason for moving so far away. He was scared that it might break them.

After his dad let go, Tyler hugged his sister and kissed her forehead, and then moved on to say good bye to his brothers, promising that he would come and see them when he could.

“My baby boy,” Tyler’s mother said as he got into the driver’s seat. Something in his chest felt like it broke and he was glad that he hadn’t told them. This was hard enough.

As he pulled out of the driveway, Tyler looked in the rear view mirror. His family was standing shoulder to shoulder and his dad had his arms around his mom, who looked like she was about to break down at any second. Tyler didn’t blame her though. He was their first kid to go far away for college. The rest had taken classes at the community college a little ways into town and had lived at home. He, however, was going to a completely different state. A place where no one knew him and he could start over, and maybe get over the immense feeling of sadness that had been plaguing his mind for the past few years.

When he got onto the highway, Tyler reached over to turn on the radio, deciding that the noise of the road and over all silence of the car was too much for him to handle. The radio however, didn’t work. It wouldn’t even light up or try to play music. Tyler sighed and shifted in his seat as he accepted that he would be alone with his thoughts for the duration of the trip.

It wasn’t the worst thing in the world, well, not for most people, but when your brain has a knack for over thinking things and questioning life, complete silence and a busy mind can be your worst enemy. For instance, Tyler’s mind drifted off to his freshman biology class where he learned about body systems. Sure, it was an innocent thought, but if you really thought about it, the fact that anyone was alive was quite amazing. How was it even possible that millions of tiny little cells could possibly bring life? How did cells exist? Why did they exist?

And how could one small thought change everything? The fact that Tyler could pull the steering wheel into the other lane and crash, possibly ending his life and other people's, passed through his mind. It’s not that he wanted to, but more like he could. He could totally make that decision and change his life in that split second. He could pull over and walk away from the car, going who knows where. He could stop in some random town and live the rest of his life there. He could go try and rob a store, because in the end, the only thing that was stopping him was the tiny little thought in the back of his head that said  _wrong._ But that little thought didn’t really mean anything. He could still do those things. They were all in his power, and that terrified him.

But why did that terrify him? What was fear? Why were people taught to fear? What were they taught to fear? Why were people even made? What was the point? Everything only died in the end.

Tyler shook his head and tied to clear his mind, but he only thing he ended up achieving was riding his mind of the thoughts of death. Instead thoughts of pain erupted. Lots and lots of pain and suffering and sadness, and before Tyler even knew what he was doing, he was pulling the car off of the highway and walking into an old truck stop.

Tyler looked around between the two isles of goods. He saw cough medicine, things for migraines, pocket knives, and little figurines of penguins. Who would need those, he thought.

In the end he bought the tiny penguins in addition to a speaker for his phone. He paid the questionable looking man at the counter and went back to his car to plug in his phone and play music. There was no way he was driving the rest of the way with just his thoughts.

Being lonely on the trip was something he could handle, but being alone was something completely different.


	2. Worry Lines and Childhood Rhymes

It was dark when Tyler reached the halfway point between his house and future college. He strained his eyes to look at the signs on the side of the hallway, trying to find a place to stop and rest. Tyler knew he wouldn’t sleep. He hardly ever did anymore. Being awake was a lot easier to deal with.

Eventually he saw a sign for a small inn and pulled off of the highway. Tyler found himself driving down the dimly lit main road for some small town. From what he could see, the town looked cozy and welcoming. He was almost tempted to pull over and walk into the real estate office he spotted, but he didn’t. Instead he continued to drive to the end of the road, ending up in front of a quaint looking inn.

Once parked, Tyler turned off the music that had been playing and grabbed an extra pair of clothes, shoving them into his backpack along with his phone and wallet. He hesitantly walked the short distance from his car to the entrance of the inn, looking over his shoulder every other step. It wasn’t that he was scared of the people that lived in the small town, but the fact that he was scared of what lived in the darkness that made him almost run up to the front desk.

“Hello! Welcome to the Forest Inn! My name is Amanda,” the lady behind the desk said. The loud and chirpy voice was out of place in the quiet and old fashioned inn. “How can I help you?

“Oh, uh,” Tyler mumbled. His brain was practically mush from driving all day and he hadn’t said a word since he’d said goodbye to his family. It was weird for him to hear his voice. “I need a room for tonight.”

“Of course! Just you? Or is anyone else going to be joining you?”

“Just me,” he answered.

“Alrighty then,” Amanda smiled. It seemed forced. She handed him a piece of paper and a pen, which Tyler signed without really paying much attention to it. He could have just sold his soul without realizing it. “Room 5, second floor, last one on the left. There’s breakfast available starting at eight and check out is at noon. Sleep well!”

Tyler smiled at her and took the key she was holding. Amanda was older than Tyler, maybe around 35, and had blond hair. There were wrinkles on her face, and Tyler knew they weren't from smiling. They looked similar to the lines he was noticing on his own face. Lines from worry and stress. But, then again, Tyler was probably looking for things he wanted to see, such as signs that he wasn’t alone.

He climbed the stairs and made his way down the hall. Behind one door he could hear a man’s voice talking in rhymes, the pitch of his voice rising and falling as he spoke each line. Giggles erupted when the man finished speaking and Tyler smiled to himself. His parents used to read him bed time stories. It used to be his favorite thing about going to bed.

Behind another door Tyler could hear steady thump against the wall. He paused for a second, confused as to what it could be, but then he heard a moan. He almost ran to the end of the hall, thanking the universe that his room was not next to theirs.

When he opened the door to his room, Tyler stopped for a second and looked around. The room was somewhat small, but Tyler didn’t really mind. The walls were covered in flower patterned wall paper, matching the bed spread almost exactly. It was cute in Tyler’s opinion. Like something his grandmother would have chosen.

He dropped his backpack onto the chair in the corner of the room and pulled out his phone, immediately dialing his mother’s number.

“Tyler! My baby! How are you? Are you doing okay? Where are you? Have you had dinner yet?” his mother asked worriedly as soon as she picked up the phone. Tyler smiled and laughed slightly. He loved his mother, he really did, but sometimes she could be a bit much.

“I’m fine, Mom. Just got to a hotel, and yes, I have had dinner,” Tyler said. He lied about the last part. He hadn’t eaten since that morning when his brother had made breakfast for the family, but his mom didn’t need to know that. She worried enough about him as it was. Plus, he hadn’t been very hungry lately.

“Good, good,” his mother replied. “I worry about you.”

“I know, Mom. But really, I’m fine.” Again, he lied. He wasn’t fine and he knew it. That’s why he had packed up and left as soon as he could. He had hoped that maybe somewhere, out in some different place he had never been to, he could find his purpose, because right now, he didn’t think he had one.

“Okay, sweetie. If you say so,” his mother said. They talked for a little while longer, or really, Tyler listened as his mother filled him in on everything that was happening around the house. Everything was the same as he had left it apparently, but his mom felt the need to tell him all of that. Tyler didn’t mind really, he knew she needed to say it.

“Hey, Mom, I should go. Check out is early tomorrow,” another lied, “and I want to get back on the road as soon as I can. I’ll call you when I get to college, okay?”

“Okay. I love you. Sleep well, Tyler.”

“I love you, too, Mom.” He really did.

Tyler fell back onto the bed and rubbed his hands over his face. He was beyond tired and felt kind of gross. Like all of the dirt and grime on the road had accumulated on his skin.

He wandered into the bathroom next to the door to his room and turned on the shower. He stripped off his clothes and stared at his reflection while he waited for the water to warm up.

“You’re stupid, Tyler,” he said to himself as he stepped under the spray of water. “There’s nothing out here for you. You have no purpose.”

The water had felt amazing as it fell on his skin, but the towel that he had wrapped around himself felt even better. It was one of those fluffy kind they always have at hotels. Tyler loved those.

When he was almost completely dried off, he pulled on a pair of sweat pants and an old shirt. He retrieved his laptop and an energy drink from his bag and opened up a new word document. He sipped on his drink idly as his fingers flew across the keyboard, capturing the thoughts that had been swarming around his head all day. He probably shouldn’t have had an energy drink and should put the laptop away and try to get some shut eye, but that’s not how Tyler worked. He didn’t sleep. He couldn’t sleep.

Whenever he tried, the sweet spell of unconsciousness never came fast enough and he became wrapped up in his own thoughts, much like what would happen in the silence of his car. It was terrifying, and when sleep would come, he’d wake up a few hours later to a nightmare so absolutely horrendous and like-like that it would haunt him for weeks. He much preferred falling asleep from pure exhaustion at some odd hour in the morning in front of his computer. It wasn’t exactly healthy, but it was better.


	3. Blushing Kangaroos

Light was just beginning to shine through the windows of Tyler’s room when he woke up. He was bent at an awkward angle, half-spooning his laptop with one leg tucked under the rest of his body. Surprisingly it was one of the less strange positions Tyler had woken up to in the morning. The most questionable of them being the time when he woke up under his bed with his right hand between the mattress and the box frame. Even he wanted to know what had happened that night.

His knees popped as he stood up and walked over to his backpack. He put his laptop back inside and pulled out a fresh pair of clothes. After slipping on a jacket and grabbing his wallet, Tyler headed out of his room and down the hall, trying to find the source of smell of bacon.

When he passed the other doors he first smiled at the thought of the father reading to his kids, but the shuddered as he remembered who had been just across the hall. Hopefully he wouldn’t run into them this early in the morning.

Upon reaching the main level of the Forest Inn, Tyler saw a sign advertising breakfast and an arrow pointing down another hall. The smell of bacon grew stronger as he walked on and it dawned on Tyler just how hungry he was. Hopefully they made enough for food for the other guests as well.

The breakfast buffet was set up in a large open room with some tables and chairs opposite the wall with the food. There were a few guests already sitting down and enjoying their meal when Tyler walked in. He saw a family of four sitting at one table, with the kids being no older than nine, and he guessed that they were the ones he had heard giggling. Then table next to them was occupied by an older lady and someone who looked to have been her daughter. The older lady was going on and on about some political scandal, and from the way the daughter was staring off into the distance, Tyler guessed that this hadn’t been the first time they had had the conversation. Tyler almost felt bad for her.

After he had grabbed a plate and filled it with everything he wanted, Tyler looked for a place to sit down. The room he was in was nice, but he wanted some place a bit quieter. He spotted an open door in the corner of the room and squinted to read the sign in from of it. Tyler smiled when he made out “Patio Seating” and walked over.

The morning air was a bit chilly but it felt good in comparison to the almost stifling breakfast room. It also had the most amazing view of the forest that Tyler guessed the inn was named after. The trees stretched into the sky and looked to be about hundreds of years old. They were practically begging to be climbed, but Tyler had made his dad a promise. Well, kind of.

“Good morning!” said a voice from behind him. Tyler turned in his chair to see the lady who had been at the front desk last night, Amanda. “I hope you slept well and are enjoying your breakfast.”

Tyler smiled at Amanda. She seemed kind. “I did, and this food is really great.”

“Well I’m glad. So, what’s a young thing like you traveling out here all by yourself?”

Tyler guessed anyone else would have been slightly taken aback by Amanda’s forwardness, but he had grown up in a smaller town, much like this one, and his mom had taught him to practice good manners.

“I’m driving down to college.”

“Oh, well isn’t that fun!”

“I guess.”

“Oh, now don’t you frown. You’ll end up with lines on your face like me, and trust me, these aren't from laughing too much. College will be fun. An adventure! Great place to find your purpose in life as my mother used to tell me.”

“Yeah, I hope so.”

And with that Amanda said goodbye, walking back into the inn. Tyler sat once again in the peaceful quite of the outdoors, listening to the morning birds chirp and the sounds of the town slowly waking up. He thought about what Amanda had told him and tried not to let his thoughts turn into worry, but it was hard. Nearly impossible. That just wasn’t how Tyler was. He was always worrying, whether he wanted to or not.

With a sigh he stood up and put his plate in the bin by the door. Check out wasn’t until noon, which left Tyler around three hours to kill. Making his way to the front desk, Tyler decided that he might as well spend that time exploring.

“What can I do for you?” a girl asked. It wasn’t Amanda for sure; she was younger, maybe more around Tyler’s age, and slightly taller, but she looked related to her in some way. The blond hair was the same.

“I was wondering if there were any places that you would recommend seeing while I’m here,” Tyler said. He hoped there was something to do. Going back to his room and waiting didn’t sound very fun, even if the inn had free wifi.

“Yeah, sure,” the girl smiled. She ended up giving Tyler a list of things to see, explaining how they were all within walking distance from the inn. Tyler thanked the girl and walked out the front doors. When he looked down at the paper to see where he wanted to go first, Tyler noticed a small note written in the corner. The girl had given him her number.

He blushed and shoved the paper into his pocket. Were people always that forward? Did people really do that?

Three hours later, Tyler had packed up everything into his backpack and was standing at the front desk for the second time that morning. The girl that had given him her number was still there, and every time she made eye contact with him, he’d blush. Situations like these were the reasons he preferred to keep to himself. He didn’t know what to do.

“Come back soon,” the girl said as Tyler turned and began walking out the front doors. Still practically drowning in awkwardness, Tyler tripped on his own feet and stumbled into the door frame, causing the girl at the desk to giggle. His face heated up more and he walked out as quickly as he could.

Once inside his car, Tyler plugged in his music and sent a quick text to his parents to let them know where he was. He probably didn’t need to, but it’s what his mom wanted. He wanted her to worry as little as possible. God knows he worried enough for everyone.

“Here we go,” he sighed to himself as he pulled out of the parking lot. "I wonder if this is considered running away. I mean, I am trying to get away from everything, just not necessarily from home. Well, yeah. Home too. But everything else first."

Tyler shook his  head as he drove down the main street and passed the real estate office he had seen last night. "Talking to yourself again, Tyler," he mumbled. "People are gonna think you're even more crazy."

Tyler got back onto the highway and immediately his mind began to wander. The thoughts weren’t violent this time, though. He was busy planning music videos in his head for the songs he was quietly singing along to. That, of course, led him to thinking how practical it would be to train a kangaroo how to tango. It was probably impossible, but that didn’t stop Tyler from thinking about it.


	4. A Cold Shower

The sun was just starting to set when Tyler reached the campus. From what he saw while driving by, it was huge. Bigger than any of the pictures from their website made it seem. If he was going to be honest with himself, Tyler felt intimidated by the size of it. He was used to small towns with small buildings and smiling faces that knew more about him when he was a kid than he remembered himself.

“But that’s why you had to leave. They knew you but they didn't  _know_  you,” Tyler whispered to himself as he pulled into the parking lot of a hotel a few blocks from his college. The school wasn’t officially open until tomorrow, which meant another night of hiding in a hotel room and trying not to let any of his thoughts get to him.

“Change of scenery,” he muttered as he parked and climbed out of his car, backpack already slung over his shoulder.

“It’ll do you some good,” he said as he walked through the spinning hotel door. This kind of door was his favorite. As a kid he’d run around and around in the spinning door at the mall when his mom would take him. He got extremely frustrated once, when his brother had told him he couldn’t slam the door. That comment, of course, led to eventual tears and many apologies directed towards the management of the department store. Apparently people didn’t like it when you tried to slam their revolving doors and accidentally broke it in the process.

Tyler didn’t go to that mall a lot anymore.

“Maybe now you can find….find…it,” Tyler mumbled to himself, still caught up in his own thoughts.

“If ‘it’ is a room for the night, I can help you there. Other than that, you’ll have to be a bit more specific.”

Tyler looked up from the floor and blushed at the realization that someone had heard him talking to himself.

“Yeah, a room would be great.”

The guy behind the desk smiled and handed Tyler something to sign. He had brown hair, most of it hidden by a red beanie, which Tyler was pretty sure was against the dress code, and a navy blue shirt with the name of the hotel embroidered on it. Tyler thought he must be around the same age, or at least just out of college. The guy’s name tag read “Mark”.

“Thanks,” Tyler said as Mark handed him his room key.

“Sure thing,” Mark smiled. “Say, are you going to college here? Well, not  _here_  here. Here is a hotel. But like, here as in the city?”

Tyler nodded his head. “Yeah, it’s my first year.”

“That’s cool. I go there, too. It’s my last year though. Also my last night working here. Can’t wait to leave,” Mark said. Tyler liked him. He was nice.

“Well, I won’t keep you any longer. Got to get to campus early and everything. Have a nice night,” Mark paused and looked down at the sheet that Tyler had signed, “Tyler Joseph. Maybe I’ll see you around campus.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Tyler smiled back.

He turned away from the desk and walked towards the elevator, heading up to the fourth floor. When he got to his room, the walk being void of any sounds coming from behind doors, Tyler set his bag down and sat on the edge of his bed.

“I think I might have just made an aquaintence” he mumbled as he got a pair of pajamas out of his bag. “I think.”

Tyler spent at least an hour in the shower. He didn’t mean to, not really. It just kind of happened. He was washing his hair, humming some show tune, when a word popped into his head. It was a normal word. One that people used all of the time, or at least felt. See, this word was also an emotion. A very intense emotion that some people had the privilege to experience multiple times a day. Tyler wasn’t one of those people.

Happiness.

What was happiness, Tyler thought. Listening to your favourite song is happiness, but how do you know that that makes you happy. Is happiness a naturally occurring thing, or is it learned at an early age? Is it something you pick up from those around you? Like, if you were to see children running around a field and playing tag, laughing and smiling, would you believe that to be happiness because that is what they perceive it to be? Are they only doing it and enjoying it because they know they should? Is tag really that fun?

No, tag isn’t that fun, Tyler thought, well, at least not for him. Basketball was fun. Or was it? Did he only enjoy it because it could’ve gotten him somewhere? Because people told him he was good? Because he  _was_  good? Why did it make him happy? Was he happy now? Had he ever really been happy?

Was anyone ever really happy?

Yes. His parents were happy. His sister was happy. He was pretty sure the dog that lived across the street from his grandparents was happy. Everyone was happy it seemed. Everyone, except for him. Tyler wasn’t happy, and that was something he couldn’t understand.

It was only when the water became unbearably cold that Tyler finally snapped out of his thoughts and climbed out of the shower. He got dressed and pulled out his phone, sending a quick text to his mom telling her that he got to the hotel alright and saying not to bother calling him tomorrow. His excuse was that he knew he was going to be tired, but really Tyler wanted to be on his own. That’s what college was all about, after all. Plus, if he freaked out, he didn't want her to know.

His mother replied with a simple “okay, sleep well!” and he plugged his phone in for the night.

He turned on the TV and started watching something about aliens and pyramids, but all he could focus on was ignoring the rumbling in his stomach. He hadn’t stopped for lunch today, and for once, he was regretting skipping the meal.

Tyler ended up grabbing a water and bag of chips from the vending machine at the end of the hall. It wasn’t the best but he hadn’t felt like exploring the new city just yet. Not on his first night here, and definitely not at night. Anything could happen and he wasn’t one to push his luck. Plus, it was dark out. Tyler didn’t like the dark. The dark meant night and night meant being alone and being alone wasn't something Tyler was very fond of these days.

When the chips were gone and his water was empty, Tyler headed to bed, deciding that for once he was going to try and sleep like a normal person and not spend the last few hours of the day and the first few hours of the next online. He might as get some good night’s sleep now before classes started because who knew how much work he would have once they did.

As his eyes drifted closed, Tyler thought about what had been racing through his mind while he was in the shower. He knew that everyone was happy. He knew that he wasn’t. He also knew that the fact that he wasn’t happy was not something he was okay with. That, and he had to do something about it.


	5. French Fries

Tyler immediately regretted his choice in chips when he woke up. Sour cream and onion had seemed great at the moment, but now his mouth tasted like he had eaten and entire bag of trash. Once his teeth were brushed and his clothes were changed, Tyler headed down do the main floor to checkout.

Mark wasn’t standing at the desk. This time it was an older lady with greying brown hair and crinkles next to her eyes. Tyler smiled at her as he checked out, replying to her comment about the weather. It was hot, he agreed, and they could do with some rain.

The drive to campus wasn’t that long. He didn’t really need to put his music on really, but he was nervous. Tyler needed any distraction he could get. He didn’t even know where to go or what to do or who to talk to. He hadn’t looked anything up. As soon as it said he had been accepted, he had packed his bags and waited for the moment he could leave. Tyler hadn’t worried about the technicalities in going to college, but now he wished he had.

“You lost?” a voice said from somewhere to his right.

Tyler was standing in the middle of some kind of crossroads of walkways with a fountain in the middle. The map he was holding made absolutely no sense and he couldn’t tell if he was holding it upside down or not.

“Yeah, kinda,” Tyler replied sheepishly. The person that had spoken was a guy around Tyler’s age and height, with a brown Mohawk that could do with a trim and bright shining eyes with a smile to match.

“Sweet,” the guy said. “I am, too. We can be lost together.”

Tyler laughed at the guy’s remark.

“Joshua Dun,” he said, holding out his hand for Tyler to shake. “But people normally just call me Josh.”

“Tyler Joseph,” Tyler introduced himself. He shook Josh’s hand, but it turned into to some kind of weird handshake halfway through.

“Well if we’re going to be friends, we’ll have to work out a secret handshake later. That was weak,” Josh laughed. Tyler joined in and thought to himself that this Josh guy was pretty cool. “For now we’ve got to figure out where we’re supposed to go and hopefully not be more lost than we are now.”

Tyler looked around. “How about we go where those guys are going,” he suggested.

“Ah!” Josh exclaimed, an even bigger smile filling his face. “I knew I’d figure out something.”

“Hey, no, you can’t take credit for that. That was all me,” Tyler said.

“There’s no one around here to prove that, now is there?” Josh questioned over his shoulder in a joking tone, already making his way over to the other group of students.

Tyler shook his head and followed Josh down the sidewalk. If he got to hang around this guy throughout the year, Tyler knew it was going to be good.

Eventually they found out where they were supposed to go. It was some big fancy building where all they did was state their name and pick up their ID along with their room key. They were given a new map, and Tyler was extremely excited about that fact that this one was actually labeled.

Josh’s room ended up being a few doors down from Tyler’s. Since they happened to be among the few students that were undecided in what they wanted to do, they had single rooms. Neither were complaining, but for completely different reasons. Josh because he played the drums and was happy that he wouldn’t have a roommate around to tell him to stop making noise, and Tyler because he had nightmares and really didn’t want anyone to know.

When they had finished unpacking and setting up their rooms, which only took about half as long as the others since neither had brought much with them, Josh and Tyler decided to walk around the city and see what there was to see. They wandered around campus for a while before walking down the main street to look for a place to eat.

Both of them, as it turned out, were from Ohio, as they found out while sharing a plate of fries. The same town in fact. It was weird that they never ran into each other before. But Tyler had explained that he was homeschooled and then gone to one of the larger public high schools, while Josh had been at the slightly smaller one across the city.

“I did almost every sport back in school. Baseball, track, you name it, I tried it,” Josh said. “What did you do?”

“Basketball. It was basically my life. Academics weren’t going to get me anywhere, so I gave sports a try.”

“Did you like basketball?” Josh questioned.

Tyler thought back to what he had thought about in the shower the other night. “Yeah. I think so,” he eventually said.

Josh nodded his head in understanding. Tyler was more than happy when Josh changed the subject.

They started talking about their childhood and telling stories of what they were like when they were little. At one point Josh told Tyler about how he had seen some kid trying to slam a revolving door at the mall and then get in trouble for doing so.

“I felt so bad for him. Like, I wanted to see if he could do it, but he couldn’t. And then everyone started yelling at him. The poor kid,” Josh said.

“Dude,” Tyler replied. “That was me.”

“No way!” Josh’s eyes were wide. “No, that wasn’t you. You’re lying.”

“No, I’m not lying!” Tyler said. “I was the kid who broke the revolving door! My brother told me I couldn’t slam it and I wanted to prove him wrong.”

“No.”

“Yes! I even got banned from there,” Tyler blushed.

“Dude, that’s sick,” Josh replied, his smile wide. Tyler smiled back.

An hour later they found themselves back at their dorm hall.

“See you later, Tyler,” Josh said as he unlocked his door.

“Yeah,” Tyler replied. “See you.”

Once Tyler had unlocked his own door and closed it behind him, he collapsed on his only half-made bed. He could finish it later. For now, all he was capable of doing was laying on his bed and staring up at the ceiling, trying to figure out what thing he was feeling was called. He had made a friend. His first real, actual friend in a new strange place, and it was awesome. He’d even said more than five words to the guy. 

Maybe, Tyler thought, this is what happiness felt like.


	6. The Treehouse

Of course, that night, Tyler hadn't slept one bit. He had straightened out his room more and put away his remaining belongings, making sure everything was in a place he could find it, and he's pretty sure the bathroom had never been as clean as it was now. But even after doing all of that, he couldn't sleep. The voices wouldn't stop.

_You have no reason to exist._

_You will amount to nothing._

_You have no friends._

_No one loves you, Tyler Joseph._

_You're all alone._

These thoughts swam around in his head, keeping him alert and awake. They screamed at him and brought him to the edge of tears. They were relentless. Not even his music could drown out the whispers of self-hatred. He felt so dark and alone in a fully lit room that was a few feet away from another human being.

His ears were ringing and it was all too much. Too much noise, too much silence. Too much light and too much darkness. Too much, too much,  _too much._

He felt everything, and yet he still felt nothing. The ability to feel was more than overwhelming, but the over powering sense of numbness was suffocating. He didn't know if he was still too much alive or on the brink of death, and he didn't necessarily want to know.

And he couldn't escape it. It wouldn't let him go. No matter how hard he tried or what he did, a voice was calling to him in the back of his head. It was telling him, no, screaming at him, to find something and destroy himself with it. To sit back and watch it all fade away. It was telling him that no one would miss him, no one would care, and no one would even bat an eyelash. And it was tempting. It was so tempting that his fingers itched with anticipation and his mind buzzed at the thought of a release.

Tyler raced throughout his room, throwing open drawers and pulling off things from shelves. He found everything sharp and anything glass that could potentially be used to hurt himself. Then he stopped and stared at his hands. They were shaking uncontrollably, much like the rest of his body. He took a deep breath.

Tyler opened the foot locker he had in his room and threw everything he had gathered into it. He locked it and took the key, flushing it down the toilet for good measure.

He had never harmed himself. He had come close, but he'd never done it, and he wasn't about to start.

For the rest of the night he sat on his bed, hands tucked under his thighs, battling the urge to bite his fingers. It was a nervous habit he had picked up as a kid. It was hard to stop.

He jumped when there was a knock on his door.

"Tyler, I'm bored," Josh's voice sounded muffled though the door. "Come play videogames with me."

Tyler thought about getting up and opening the door, but apparently his body didn't get the message. All he could do was sit on the edge of his bed, like he had been doing all night long, and stare at the still closed door.

"Tyler?"

Something inside him snapped and Tyler suddenly found himself standing in front of his door with his hand on the knob. He wasn't even aware that he had moved. Slowly he turned the knob and opened the door.

"Dude, you look awful," Josh said as soon as he got a good look at Tyler. He had bags under his eyes and they were bloodshot, almost as if he had been up all night crying. Tyler didn't know if he had cried or not. It was a possibility though. "Did I wake you up?"

Tyler shook his head. The sudden movement made the room spin and it took a few seconds for his eyes to focus back on Josh's face.

"Did you even sleep?" Josh asked when he noticed that Tyler was still in the clothes he had been wearing yesterday.

Again Tyler shook his head. The room only spun a little bit the time, but it was still enough for Tyler to be momentarily caught off balance and sway side to side. Josh sighed and grabbed onto Tyler's arm to first steady him and then pull him into his room. He made Tyler sit down on his bed, which was still perfectly made. Josh looked at Tyler in a way that demanded an explanation, but all Tyler did was stare at him with a vacant look in his eyes.

Beyond concerned and borderline worried to death, Josh went through Tyler's closet and pulled out a new pair of clothes. He shoved them into Tyler's arms and ushered him towards his bathroom.

"Take a shower, okay? Don't come out until you feel more like yourself," Josh said.

Tyler nodded and closed the bathroom door. He stripped and turned on the shower in a daze, only becoming aware of his surroundings when the hot water had turned cold. He suddenly felt terrible for Josh seeing him like this. Had it happened at home, he would've just waited until his family was out of the way and walked through the forest at the end of his street and sat in the treehouse some kids had built a long time ago. He would've stayed there until he felt a little more human, taken a few pictures of the trees, and then gone home and make up something about how pretty this one particular tree was when his mom asked him where he had been.

But this wasn't home, well, now it was, but there was no treehouse. There was no mother to lie to. There was no hiding how he felt because someone had seen him when he was off in whatever world his mind escaped to.

Oh god, he thought. Someone had seen him while he was like that. And it wasn't just anyone, it was that really cool guy Josh Dun that played the drums and was becoming his friend. He probably thought that Tyler was a freak now.

When Tyler finally left his bathroom after coming to terms that he might be back to square one and have absolutely zero friends, he was surprised to find Josh standing by his shelves holding the tiny penguin figurines he had bought on his road trip down here.

"These are pretty cool," Josh said, holding one of the penguins up. "Where did you get them?"

"Some roadside truck stop. It was kind of an impulse buy," Tyler explained while he put his dirty clothes into his hamper. He was waiting for the moment when Josh would either laugh in his face and walkout or call him a freak and walkout. Tyler always jumped to the worst possible conclusions.

So when Josh set the penguin down and looked at him with concern and worry prominent in his dark brown eyes, Tyler was surprised that neither of those things happened.

"You okay?"

Tyler was silent for a second. He was taken aback because one, Josh wasn't walking out on him, and two, he was worried for Tyler. Like a friend would, Tyler thought.  _Like an actual friend._

"Yeah," Tyler smiled.

Josh returned the smile and then walked towards the door, already going on and on about what games he had and how he was totally going to kick Tyler's but at all of them. Tyler only laughed and followed Josh to his room because yeah, he was okay. Well, at least now.


	7. Baked Beans

"I win again!" Josh chanted as Tyler buried his face in his hands. They had been in Josh's room all morning playing whatever game was within reach.

"That's because I was second player this time. I normally play first player and the screen thing was messing me up," Tyler defended himself. That probably wasn't the case, but Josh didn't need to know that he was just naturally bad at any game besides Mario Kart.

"Dude," Josh said as he dug through his pile of games for a new one to put in, "You've said that the past three times you lost. You don't need to lie."

"It's true!"

"Sure, whatever," Josh joked.

The start screen for the new game flashed up in the screen. It was one that Tyler had played many times before with his sister. She had only ever managed to beat him once, and so of course, Tyler considered himself a pro.

Tyler let his mind wander as he continually smashed his thumb down on the A button. He thought about how weird it was that he was sitting in someone else's room, a  _friend_  at that, and he was enjoying himself. Tyler couldn't remember a time when this last happened. It was probably around fifth grade, right before his old best friend, Blake, had moved away.

They had been extremely close as kids. It was rare to find them at their own houses without the other. Tyler was pretty sure that he spent the entire summer between fourth and fifth grade living in the basement of Blake's house. Tyler guessed that was when he was the happiest. Sitting on Blake's old beat up couch and reading all of his older brother's comics and laughing at children's shows.

But then Blake had moved. It wasn't even an "Oh this house is getting small. Let's go find one a few streets over". No. It was "Look Dad got a new job. I hope you know German".

"Hey, man," Josh nudged his shoulder. Tyler looked over at him and blinked his eyes a few times. The game was on pause and Tyler' remote control was barely in his hands. "You okay?"

Tyler shot him a quick smile. "Yeah. I'm fine."

"You sure? You looked almost upset. Is it because soemthing happened last night?"

The concerned look on Josh's face made Tyler' chest ache in a way he wasn't familiar with. Some one cared about him and this someone wasn't his family. He had no obligation to be worried about Tyler, he was just some kid that he ran into the other day, but yet, he did care, and from the look he was giving Tyler, he cared quite a bit.

"Just thinking, you know? Like, about the past and stuff," Tyler replied. He figured he might as well be somewhat truthful.

"Whoa, classes haven't even started yet. It's way too early to be revisiting your past glories," Josh joked. He had a smile on his face, obviously trying to lighten the mood and make Tyler smile as well, but Tyler was sure he could still see the shadow of worry clouding Josh's dark eyes.

Tyler didn't blame him. He worried about himself, too.

"Come on," Josh said suddenly, standing up and turning off his small TV, "Let's go get something to eat. It's pushing one and I saw this flier for burgers yesterday and now I really want one."

Tyler hesitated.

"Dude. They had macaroni and cheese  _and_  bacon on them. We've gotta go."

It was that simple sentence that sold Tyler. He wasn't one to pass up on macaroni and cheese on a burger with bacon. Only fools did that. Tyler may be sad and not quite happy, but he was no fool.

The restaurant was only a few blocks away so they decided to walk. Plus, gas cost a lot more out here than it did back home. Tyler wondered why people still drove cars everywhere. Bikes were clearly a better investment. Or seaways. Segways are cool.

"What are you thinking about now?" Josh asked. He had noticed he deep look of concentration in Tyler's face.

"The crumbling economy," Tyler replied.

"First you past glories and now the state of our country?" Josh let out a laugh. "College is sure getting to you."

Tyler smiled back and held the door to the restaurant open for Josh.

Even if he felt really gross and abnormally full and almost a little fat, Tyler was glad he agreed to go out and get the burgers. Never before had he had something so right yet so wrong at the same time. That, and he and Josh shared more slightly embarrassing stories from their childhood.

"Seriously?" Tyler asked between gasps for air.

"Yeah," Josh admitted sheepishly.

"They kicked you out for that?"

"Well, I mean, I did kind of knock down the entire display. But it wasn't my fault!"

"Yeah, sure," Tyler joked. "You totally aren't to blame for knocking over the baked beans tower. That baby was solely to blame."

"It was giving me the stink eye!" Josh defended.

"It was a baby!"

"Yeah, well," Josh blushed even more. Tyler laughed at how this was kinda like hoe he got banned from the mall for slamming the revolving door. Except this involved a baby and baked beans. "It wasn't as bad as the time I took my dog to get groceries. The owner was completely pissed."

"What happened?"

"He peed in the cereal isle. I don't really know why. He pulled me into a display as well, but it was for this new fancy olive oil that came in really poorly designed glass bottles."

Tyler let out another round of laughter and had to bite his knuckles to try and stop because the elderly couple in the booth across from them was giving them dirty looks.

When they were back at campus, they decided to try and explore. Better get lost now than when classes start and they actually have to be somewhere on time, or so Tyler thought. Josh didn't really seem to care about figuring out where they were in relation to other buildings. He was too preoccupied in pointing out other people walking around the campus and making up pretend conversations for them in mocking voices. Tyler didn't know it, but Josh was doing that for him.

Sure, he had only known Tyler for a day, but there was something about Tyler that told Josh that he didn't smile as much as he should. And that, to Josh, was one of the saddest things he had ever realized.

When they finally retreated back to their own rooms, after becoming hopelessly lost and ending up two miles from campus as the sun was setting, Josh decided that no matter what it took, he was going to make sure Tyler was happy.


	8. Throwing Punches

It was the night before classes started and Tyler, naturally, was freaking out. He stared at his face in the mirror, studying every detail as if he was going to have to paint a hyper-realistic self-portrait in only a few hours. He cringed whenever his eyes would pass over a bump or a scar or an out of place hair. He frowned when he noticed just how crooked his teeth were. He turned away from the mirror when he realized that his ears were  _two different heights_.

"You even look like a loser," he mumbled to himself.

Tyler turned off the lights in his bathroom and stumbled over to his bed. He collapsed down onto it and curled up in a small ball, something he often did whenever he felt scared at night. It didn't really do much. If anything the position made him more vulnerable to physical attacks since his head was bent towards his chest and his arms were covering his face, but he felt safer like this. Safe was good. Safe was, well, safe.

While he laid there in his bed, his thoughts began to wander like they always did, much to his annoyance. Tyler was used to the onslaught of questions he didn't have answers to and thoughts from questionable origins, but he was still annoyed by it. It was his equivalent of waking up every morning to a loud and ugly sounding bird chirping at the window. He was used to it and expected it, but he longed for it to stop and let him sleep.

"Stupid mind-birds," Tyler grumbled. "Not letting me sleep."

He shifted his position so he could read the clock on his bedside table. It was already midnight and he had promised himself that he would be asleep by ten. But no, it couldn't be that simple. He had to get over crippling self-hatred and ponder over the course of the human existence first.

Suddenly Tyler's phone buzzed.

Josh: Dude, go to sleep.

Tyler: How did you know I'm still awake?

Josh: Your sleep schedule is whacked, man. You're always up when you shouldn't be.

Tyler thought about that. Josh, even with only knowing him for a week, already knew how messed up Tyler's life was.

Josh: Everything will be fine tomorrow. Go to sleep.

Tyler frowned.

Tyler: Are you sure?

When Tyler saw that Josh had read the text but not replied, he sighed and set his phone on his bedside table. He didn't blame Josh for being annoyed with him.

A knock on Tyler's door brought him out of his thoughts. He stood up, after checking that yes, he was in fact wearing pants, and opened the door to see a still very much awake Josh dressed in a matching rainbow pajama top and bottoms.

"I am completely sure," Josh said before Tyler had a chance to say anything.

Tyler stepped away from his door and Josh walked into the room, finding a spot on Tyler's bed.

"Dude," Tyler laughed when he had shut the door, "What's with the get up?"

Josh shrugged. "I felt as though my life was lacking a bit of color. This was my only solution that didn't involve permanent ink and angry parents."

Tyler nodded and tried not to laugh again. It wasn't every day that you saw a guy like Josh dressed in clothes that looked like a Care Bear puked on them. Instead, Tyler sat down next to Josh with his back leaning against the wall. He let his eyes fall closed and let out a sigh.

"What's on your mind?" Josh asked.

Tyler didn't reply immediately. He didn't know how to. It wasn't like he could just announce that everything was pointless and life wouldn't change for anyone if he just left. Well, he could, but that was no way to assure people that you were mentally okay. It was like punching them with your personal problems. Not many people appreciated it after only a week's worth of friendship.

"I could totally punch you in the face right now. Why shouldn't I?"

Josh wasn't even surprised that Tyler didn't exactly answer his question. He had realized pretty quickly that Tyler's mind worked differently and was used to seemingly random and off topic answers in reply to something he asked. But this seemed a little violent for Tyler, the guy who couldn't open the door to the library because it was too heavy.

"Uh," Josh stuttered as he slightly shifter away from Tyler. "Because it's wrong?"

"Yeah, but why is it wrong?"

"I don't get what you mean," Josh said. Tyler opened his eyes and Josh could see something swimming just under the surface. Confusion? Desperation? Fear?

"Like, I have the capability to do it, but I know it's wrong. You know it's wrong. Everyone knows that you shouldn't just punch someone in the face because it's wrong. But why is it wrong? It's some kind of moral thing, something we're taught at a young age, but why are we taught that?"

Josh thought for a moment. "Maybe it's because punching people hurts them and hurting people is bad."

Tyler turned his head to face Josh. His eyebrows were knitted together in deep thought and he had a frown on his face. He knew Josh wasn't going to have the answer he was looking for, and he definitely wasn't going to connect the symbolization that Tyler had used to represent his own thoughts, but Tyler needed to ask him. He needed to ask someone. Anyone.

"Is it?" Tyler asked after a few moments of silence.

Now it was Josh's turn to frown. He didn't quite know what was going on with Tyler. One minute he would seem completely fine and be laughing with Josh about some stupid thing they saw on the internet, and the next moment he would be staring out the window with such an intense look of sadness on his face that Josh would think that his bunny just died. Josh didn't understand and didn't know how to help his newfound friend, and that made him upset.

After another few minutes of silence, Josh shifted on the bed so that he could lay down. He wasn't about to leave Tyler when he was asking all these really vague and slightly out of context questions. He might not know what was exactly going on, but Josh knew when someone needed another person to be around. Tyler was glad that Josh knew that. Never in a million years would Tyler know how to ask someone to stay with him because he's a little scared.

Josh fell asleep and Tyler, eventually, did as well. Maybe it was the presence of another person in the room with him or maybe the fact that this person was his friend, but for once, Tyler fell asleep and didn't wake up in a panic two hours later. For once, Tyler just slept.


	9. A Dinner-Taco Kind Of Guy

As soon as Josh woke him up by persistently poking him in the side with his foot, Tyler knew something was off. He felt different. Like he had come to some sort of realization late in the night and everything suddenly made sense. Like he figured out the meaning of life sometime during his dreamless sleep. He felt warm. He felt content. He felt  _rested._

"I didn't, like, wake up in the middle of the night or anything, did I?" Tyler asked when he unfolded himself from his spot against the wall.

"No, you were out all night. I fell off the bed one point and you were still asleep," Josh answered. The question sparked a feeling of worry inside Josh, but he didn't let his voice or face give anything away. He could tell letting Tyler know that he was worried about him was going to do nothing to help his friend.

Tyler sighed in relief at Josh's response. He couldn't believe that he actually slept the entire night without waking up from a nightmare. They had been getting progressively worse each night he slept in his dorm room. The fact that he was actually on his own and being completely independent was finally sinking into him and giving him all sorts of anxieties and worries, or, at least that what he told himself. But maybe things were getting better. Maybe everything was going to be okay, just like Josh had told him last night.

"So," Josh yawned as he stood up and stretched, "I've got class in about three hours and you've got one at eight, right?"

Tyler nodded. He had thought that once he graduated high school he wouldn't have to wake up insanely early any more for classes, but he had been sorely mistaken. Eight o'clock speech, halfway across campus. The perfect start to every Monday for the rest of the year.

"Why don't we go grab some tacos?" Tyler found himself suggesting.

He was a little surprised at his prospect. Normally he would only eat when it seemed that he would either die without some sort of food, or if the person he was with at the moment threatened to shove it down his throat. Plus he didn't even like tacos, or at least not breakfast tacos. He was more of a dinner-taco kind of guy.

"Sounds sweet," Josh smiled. "Let's go." He stood up and opened Tyler's door, tossing Tyler's keys to him as he went.

Tyler furrowed his eyebrows together. "Aren't you like, gonna change or anything? I mean..." his words faded away and he motioned towards Josh's current wardrobe.

"Nah, I'm good. I believe in a strong first impression."

Tyler shook his head and laughed. He threw on a pair of shoes and was soon following Josh out of their dorm hall and to his car.

The tacos were actually really, really good, Tyler found out. They were so much different that dinner-tacos and way better than any of the tacos he had had back home. The six discarded aluminum foil wrappers that covered the table told Tyler that Josh felt the same.

When eight o'clock rolled around, Tyler stumbled into his speech class with dripping hair and hardly any breath in his lungs. He had extremely underestimated the amount of time it took to cross the campus on foot and take a shower. Plus it didn't help that there was this really pretty blond girl he had run into on his way over. Of course Tyler took the time to help her up and make sure she was okay. He also apologized, ten times, before she insisted that really she was okay and hoped that he had a good day. He was still sort of blushing.

Tyler had barely taken five steps into the room when a familiar voice called out his name.

"Tyler Joseph!"

Tyler snapped his head in the direction of the voice, completely puzzled for a few seconds. He was pretty sure he didn't know anyone on campus besides Josh, but then he saw who was waving at him from the middle of the sea of chairs.

"Hey, Mark," Tyler greeted.

Mark waved him over to the spot next to him and Tyler halfheartedly set down his bag. He would much rather sit somewhere towards the back, or at least on the far side of the room, but it was impossible to say no to Mark, especially when he wore a smile like he had been friends with you for years.

"How have you been?" Mark asked excitedly. Tyler thought he looked a lot more comfortable in this setting than at the hotel. Back there it had seemed as though someone had forced the uncomfortable looking uniform onto the guy, but now Mark acted completely relaxed as if he was in his element. He probably is, Tyler thought.

"Pretty good, I guess. You?"

"Oh, I'm great. Did you meet anyone yet? Have a good roommate?" Mark was almost talking a mile a minute. Tyler wasn't sure how anyone could possibly be so awake at such an early hour in the morning, but then he saw an energy drink on the table in front of Mark, and another one sticking out of his bag.

"No, no roommate, but I met this guy Josh."

"No roommate? You're one of those undeclared ones, huh?" Mark mused.

Tyler blushed a little bit. He was so terrified of the future that he felt physically ill when he was told that he had to make up his mind about a career before even stepping foot in college. He decided being undeclared was the route for him, even if the fact that not knowing his future scared him, too.

"No, don't be embarrassed 'bout it. I was undeclared my first year. Then I ran into someone and found my passion. Oh god, that sounds so cheesy, doesn't it?" Mark laughed. Tyler joined in and they fell into a conversation about the technicalities of media related things, Mark supplying most of the conversation as he was the one who was trying to major in it, until the professor showed up.

When the class was over, Tyler waved goodbye to Mark, made a promise to hang out sometime, and headed off to the building where his next class was going to be.

Tyler spent the rest of the day listening to welcome lectures and class procedures. The professors in college were a lot less strict than anything Tyler had encountered in high school. Three of them had asked to be called by their first names and another had the mouth of a sailor.

When he finally collapsed onto his bed after his last class, Tyler let his eyes drift close. He braced himself for the inevitable onslaught of thoughts and voices to come and pick him apart and point out everything wrong he had done throughout the day, and sure enough, there they were.

He hadn't even  _done_  anything. All he did was sit and listen, but no, apparently he couldn't even do that right. The way he had talked to the girl he ran into that morning was embarrassing and his voice had sounded stupid. The way he hadn't really said much when he was talking to Mark. The way he walked into his calculus class and sat down. It was all wrong and embarrassing and stupid and  _wrong_  and Tyler honestly didn't think he would mind if his bed swallowed him up right now and he never saw the light of day again.

Tyler groaned. Things hadn't always been like this. There used to be a time when he excitedly told everyone what he had learned while they ate. There was a time when meeting new people was fun. Back then he didn't have all of his mind numbing insecurities and sickening thoughts. Back then everything was easier; talking to people, sitting in a chair, asking a question. Tyler wished he could go back to when everything made sense, or at least, remember it, but just like everything else, it wasn't that easy. He was stuck in a world where his demons controlled his actions and every possible good day led to a regret filled evening and a sleepless night.

Maybe Josh hadn't been as right as Tyler initially thought.


	10. Drumsticks

The week passed Tyler by in a blur. He was vaguely aware of what they had gone over in each of his classes, but beyond that, he was clueless. He knew he had talked to Mark a bit more and had gotten his number, and he knew that he had seen the blond girl hanging out near the library, and he was pretty sure that he had gone over to Josh's room after their classes had ended every day to play video games and laugh about stupid things, but he couldn't for the life of him remember the specifics.

What had he and Josh played? What did he talk to Mark about? Had he made any plans to hang out with him yet? Did he smile at the girl? What did he have for lunch? Did he even have lunch? Or breakfast? Dinner? Had he even left the vicinity of his dorm room for more than two hours?

Tyler couldn't answer any of it. He was lost inside his own head and couldn't find the map. It was pretty stupid, Tyler thought, to be confused by what goes on inside your own head. Seriously, he should know how his mind works by now. He's been living with it for a good amount of time now. Everyone else had their lives together and got things done and didn't get confused by their own thoughts. Why couldn't Tyler be like that?

"It would be so much easier being someone else," Tyler mumbled to himself. As soon as the words left his mouth, he wanted to take them back. Nobody else talked to themselves randomly throughout the day. Just another item on the list of reasons as to why I'm not, and won't be, normal, Tyler thought.

The door to his dorm opening caused Tyler to sit upright. Josh had been over at his room so often that he gave up on locking it during the day, but it wasn't Josh standing at the door. It was the guy whose room was right across the hall from Josh, a tall, lanky boy with brown hair and glasses named Michael.

"Hey, what's up?" Tyler asked. Michael didn't really talk that much. In fact, he talked less than Tyler did, which was saying something. The most Tyler had ever heard the guy say was the other morning when he had been talking to some other person about a show he had gone to, and even at that he only said about two sentences, each containing seven words at most.

"I think something happened to Josh. He's really upset and he won't stop shaking," Michael explained. His eyebrows knitted together in confusion. "I think it would help if you were with him."

Tyler was on his feet in a matter of seconds.

"Where?"

Michael pointed down the hall to the siting area that was set up for their floor. Tyler rushed out of the room, calling a thank you out over his shoulder as he went. There was a voice in his head telling Tyler that there wasn't anything he could do to help Josh. That he was too broken to help anyone else, but right now his friend needed him, and nothing was going to stop him.

"Josh?" Tyler said, worry making his voice crack.

Josh was sitting on the couch. His eyes were wide and unblinking, panic and fear prominent in his face. Tyler didn't know what it was like to feel his heart break, but he was pretty sure this was as close as he'd ever get.

"Josh, what's wrong?" Tyler asked as he sat down next to him. He wrapped an arm around his friend to try to stop him from shaking, but his efforts were in vain.

"I thought I saw the guy who used to beat me up," Josh half-whispered.

The frown on Tyler's face deepened. "What? Where?"

"At the mall. I was getting some new drumsticks and the guy at the counter looked exactly like him and I just. I freaked. I couldn't do it," Josh shook his head. "I ran out of there and came back."

"But it wasn't him?"

"No," Josh sighed. "Thank God, no. This guy's name was like, Nate or something. The guy from my school was named Darren. But still, it scared me so bad. I didn't know what to do and I felt like I couldn't breathe." Josh was on the edge of tears now. Tyler moved closer and pulled Josh into a hug. He wasn't very good with comforting words, but holding someone until they had calmed down was something Tyler could do. God knows he did it to himself almost every night.

A half hour passed before Josh had calmed down enough to stand up. He was still pretty shaken, which Tyler understood, so they headed back to Josh's room and spent the rest of their Saturday eating cold pizza from the other night and playing videogames they had already beaten at least twenty one times.

Josh passed out at eight, exhausted from his panic attack earlier. Tyler tossed a blanket over him and turned out the lights. He went back to his own room and got his keys. Josh had said that he freaked before he even bought the drumsticks, and Tyler knew how much he needed new ones, so he decided he would go out and get them.

When he got back from the mall, he went over to Josh's room and left the drumsticks near his head, a place where Josh was sure to see them when he woke up. Once he was sure that Josh was still okay, he went back to his own room, deciding that the best thing to do was take a shower.

Wrong. Tyler spent the entire time worrying about Josh and the guy who used to beat him up. Why would anyone ever want to beat up Josh? He was so loving and caring and a genuinely nice person. Why would anyone want to hurt him? Sure, his puns could use a little bit of work, but his other jokes were fantastic. How could someone be so mean as to go after Josh? How could anyone be so mean as to go after anybody?

Why did people get bullied? Why did people bully? Why did people hurt others? Why did people hurt themselves? Why did Tyler want to hurt himself? Why was it so tempting? Why was it so easy to do? Why couldn't he just do it?

Why was he so weak?

Tyler left the shower gasping for air. His heart was beating way too fast and his hands were shaking. When he looked in the mirror, he didn't see what he saw yesterday. He saw someone who was scared of going to sleep and sometimes kept the lights on at night. He saw someone who spent their entire life hiding in the shadows for fear of public embarrassment. He saw fear. He saw anxiety. He saw the wish of a quick end and no tomorrow, but no will to do anything to make the wish come true.

He saw himself.

And that terrified him.

He quickly left the bathroom and sat down on his bed. He counted to ten once. Then again. And again. And again. And again and again and again again again again until ten became twenty and twenty became forty and fifty and soon he was trying to see what the highest number he could count to was.

When he got to 1,003 his heartbeat began to slow down and the numbers started sounding like a foreign language.


	11. Panic Cookies

Tyler knocked on Josh's door at nine the next morning. He would've much rather stayed in his room all day and drown out everything in real life with his music, but after what had happened yesterday, Tyler knew that Josh would need someone today. Plus, his problems were all just made up anyway, Tyler thought. Josh had real problems. Tangible problems. Physical things to deal with. All Tyler had was an oppressing feeling of sadness and loneliness. Nothing too serious.

"How are you doing?" Tyler asked as soon as Josh opened the door. His hair was dripping wet and his eyes seemed brighter than they did yesterday.

"Better. A lot. I'm good," Josh smiled. "Oh, and thanks for the drumsticks. You didn't have to. I could've gone back or something. I can pay you back if you want."

"Don't worry about it," Tyler waved him off.

They spent the rest of the morning and part of the afternoon sitting in Josh's room and finishing up some readings they had for their classes. Josh had given up on his calculus work at one point, even after Tyler had tried to explain it to him, and moved onto reading for his art history class, which he also gave up on after only five minutes. Tyler, being too distracted by Josh aimlessly pacing the length of his room, put away his books as well and ended up agreeing to listening a new "thing", as Josh called it, that Josh had come up with on the drums the other day.

"That was pretty sick," Tyler said when silence took the place of drums.

"Really? Because like, I thought of it in a dream a while back."

"I felt it in my soul. Like the Drum Gods had graced me with their presence, grabbed ahold of my inner-most being, and shook it like they were at some sketchy concert for a rock band full of old people," Tyler elaborated.

"Specific," Josh mused as he looked at Tyler with great interest. "I like it."

"We're going over using strange things to relate stuff to, well, different ways. It's more fun if it's strange," Tyler explained.

Josh laughed a bit and stood up, shaking his head at his friend. He really didn't understand Tyler at all. He was the one who laughed the loudest at every single lame joke, but also the guy who locked himself in his room to cry, or at least that's what Josh assumed he was doing; Tyler could be having tea parties that happened to involve lots of tears for all Josh knew. Tyler was the person who cares the most about helping everyone else with their problems, but won't even think twice about helping themselves even every once in a while. The saddest person Josh had ever met, while simultaneously being the happiest. It didn't make sense; any of it.

Josh didn't really understand how that could be, but then again, not everything was black and white. Sometimes there were colors in between that were really hard to see, and once you saw them, everything changed and everything made sense. He couldn't see those colors right now, though. Josh guessed he would just have to look a bit closer.

At some point, neither was sure when, the two had decided to head over to the library to try and study in a place without any distractions. Tyler was a bit hesitant, as he and silence didn't really get along, but Josh reminded him that there were vending machines with "those really dry but really good" cookies in them. Tyler couldn't argue with the cookies.

When they got there, and after they had gotten their cookies, Josh had immediately gone in search of a book on some old dead painter guy, leaving Tyler alone at a table in front of a window. He didn't really want to be alone, and had hoped that Josh would've stayed behind with him, but he had work to finish, as did Josh, so Tyler sat all by himself, humming quietly to fill the suffocating silence of his corner and reading something about bugs.

Why do bugs have so many legs, Tyler wondered. How do they even live? Do they have blood? Lungs? Do they even breathe? How can a thing live it doesn't breathe? How do human live if they  _do_  breathe? How long can I hold my breath?

Tyler had only counted to ten when someone coughed behind him and broke his concentration.

After a few more minutes of Tyler staring blankly at the page he was supposed to be reading, which consisted of a diagram mapping out how electrical signals get passed into the brain, Josh wandered over to the table and sat down across from Tyler. With him he had three very large, very old looking books, all with a different painting on the cover. Tyler was suddenly insanely glad that he let his younger sister talk him out of taking art history.

But would he have enjoyed it? What if art history was the one class that would have changed Tyler's life? He would never know now. His purpose in life could be somewhere among those pages Josh was barely even glancing over now. He could have found a reason to live, and actually enjoy living, within the words that Josh's eyes were skimming over. His one true joy in the world could have been discovered in the lectures Josh's teacher gave, but Tyler would never know.

He could never find his purpose now. There were too many things that Tyler hadn't done or read or seen or heard and there was no way he would ever find something worth living for because there were too many places to look and he was doing it all alone because no matter how much he wanted to break down and cry for help no words would come out and voice in the back of his head would remind him that no one would ever help the worthless kid.

_Nothing, Tyler Joseph._

_You are nothing,_ his mind screamed.

_You never have been and you never will._

_The only thing you are good at is being sad, but you have no reason to be._

_So many other people have it worse than you. Your problems don't matter. They aren't real. They don't count._

_You're so pathetic._

_You are nothing._

_Nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing nothing...._

"Tyler, you okay?"

Tyler snapped out of his thoughts and looked up with wide eyes. His breath was coming out shakily, and he was sure that anyone looking at him right now would've thought he just ran a marathon through a haunted house, which in reality, wasn't too far off.

"Yeah," he eventually breathed out. "Yeah, I'm fine."

"Okay, good. Don't want you passing out. There'd be no way I could carry you back to your room."

Tyler let out a small, humorless laugh as Josh went back to reading his book. Josh had no idea how close Tyler had been to a full on panic attack.

Tyler willed himself to forget what he had been thinking only moments ago. It was hard, well, more like nearly impossible since one doesn't just "get over" almost having a panic attack no matter how much one wants to, but he managed. Instead, Tyler tried to focus all of his energy on reading about bugs.

By the end of the day, after buying more of those really dry cookies and parting ways with Josh, Tyler knew two things.

One, he really didn't like bugs and the way they breathed was kind of weird.

And two, the voices in his head were right.


	12. The Night's End

It was Wednesday night. It was hot, the humidity was unbearable, and nothing Tyler was doing could cool his room down. He had tried the tactic of studying until his brain fried up, allowing him to pass out without a second thought about the heat, but for once Tyler couldn't get lost in the jumble of big, fancy sounding words.

When the clock struck one in the morning, he started to get scared.

Normally when he was up this late it meant that his mind was moving too fast for him to even think, but today, it was moving too slow. His thoughts were so simple and calm and for once he felt relaxed and it terrified him. He had never felt this calm. Not even when he took that who-knows-how-long bath while watching the entire Lord of the Rings movie series that one time.

Tyler eventually rose from his bed, slipped on a shirt, more-appropriate-for-public basketball shorts, and his shoes. Quietly, he walked down the hallway of his dorm and into the large sitting room at the end. A figure hunched over a book and a canvas in the corner of the room picked his head up at the sound of Tyler's footsteps.

"Hey, Michael," Tyler said, acknowledging the other's presence.

"Hey," he replied. Michael wiped a hand across his brow and smudged what looked like bright purple paint across his forehead. "What are you up to?"

"Taking a walk. Can't sleep," Tyler explained. Michael nodded his head and Tyler asked his what he was painting so late, or rather, early in the morning.

"It's supposed to be a cat for my art class, but right now it looks like a potato. My brother is better at this kind of stuff."

Tyler nodded. He had seen Michael's brother hanging around the dorm a few times. He always seemed to have a sketch book under his arm and a pencil twisting between his fingers. Michael's older brother was cool. A lot more talkative than Michael, but still cool.

"You okay?" Michael asked after a few seconds.

Again Tyler nodded his head, mumbling something about being back soon before heading out the door into the sickening heat.

Tyler walked along the empty sidewalks, weaving in between the dark and empty buildings. Again, Tyler noticed how calm and peaceful everything was. For the first time he had moved down here, for the first time in his life actually, the voices in his head were quiet and the only thing he could hear was his breathing, reminding him that he was still alive, no matter how surreal everything felt to him at the moment.

Eventually Tyler sat down on a bench under a tree on the far side of campus. Bugs flew around the light post that illuminated the small intersection of sidewalks. Tyler watched as the bugs bounced off of the glass protecting the light, only to ram into it again a second later. He didn't understand why they did it, though he was sure someone had explained it to him at some point. It was interesting to watch, he decided. In a strange way, it was entertaining.

A few minutes passed and Tyler heard footsteps approaching the bench he was sat at. The footsteps were slow and light, almost as if they didn't have destination but were sill hesitant to get there. It reminded Tyler of how his footsteps had sounded when he walked over here.

Tyler looked up as the walking figure came closer to him.

It was a girl, he found out. A tall, thin girl with long legs and blonde hair. A jacket hung limp in her arms and her face was cast downwards, as if she were walking on a tightrope and didn't want to lose focus on the wire for fear of falling.

As she drew nearer, she raised her head. Tyler then realized that it wasn't just any blonde girl, but it was the girl he had run into on the first day of school.

She smiled and moved closer to the bench, looking down at Tyler with a question in her eyes. Tyler scooted closer to his end of the bench and gestured for her to sit down. She smiled again and sat herself on the opposite side of the bench from Tyler, her eyes looking far off into the night, with what looked like tears threatening to spill out at any moment.

The two sat in complete silence; both too lost in in their thoughts to initiate any sort of conversation. It wasn't weird though. It was peaceful. It was calm. It was different.

Tyler's thoughts, as well as his eyes, began to wander while he sat next to the unknown girl. He looked from building to building trying to find something. He didn't really know what he was looking for, or if he was even looking for something at all, but his eyes continued to travel from window to tree to bug to door to passing car to blade of grass.

He thought about how everything was going on around him. Life was going on and it didn't matter if he was sitting in that bench to witness it or not. He could be back in his room and that white truck still would have run that red light. He could be back in his old room at his parent's house and those bugs would still try to get into the light. He could be anywhere and life would continue on. He could be nowhere, and there would be no difference.

The realization hit Tyler that if he was dead, nothing in that moment would be different. His absence wouldn't mean anything. There would simply be empty space where he was and no one would know he was supposed to fill it.

The Tyler began to think about how no one would care if he was gone. He didn't have any real friends and his parents wouldn't have to pay for his school any longer. Everything would be easier for everybody else if he just left. If he just permanently ended it all, no one would miss him. Plus, he would be stress free and not have to worry about fighting the demons that lived in his brain every day.

He would be free.

Nothing would change and he would be free.

As the night was coming to an end, he began to think of how and where and for once he wasn't freaking out that he was actually considering this. Normally he would have one thought and then go lock himself in his room to panic until the feeling passed. But not this time. This time he was serious. This time he was going to do it. This time he wasn't stopping.

_This time I won't be weak._

A small smile formed on Tyler's lips. He was content with his thoughts and for once he felt like he knew what he was doing. He felt sure. He felt positive. He felt like he finally found his purpose: to die.

Suddenly a voice spoke out into the dark.

"The sun is going to rise soon," the girl next to him said. She sounded distant and on the edge of crying. "See you around."

With that she rose from her seat and walked back down the sidewalk she had come from, leaving Tyler alone on the bench once again. Her words repeated in his head over and over again. They seemed ordinary; something people say all the time, but this felt different to Tyler. Maybe it was the atmosphere or the tone of her voice or maybe the thoughts that had been running through his head that made Tyler really stop and think, but he didn't really care at the moment.

The sun was going to rise, and he was either going to be there to see it, or he wasn't.

The girl as going to go about her day on campus, and he was either going to see her, or he wasn't.

The choice to end it all right then and there was still sitting in the back of his mind, and he was either going to act on it, or he wasn't.

When Tyler got back to his own room, he decided that he wasn't.


	13. Doing Good

Just like Saturday eventually rolled around, Tyler eventually rolled out of bed around noon. With hesitation and regret in his steps, he made his way over to his bathroom and turned on the shower.

"Am I happy?" Tyler asked the water as he stood outside of the shower and watched it fall. "Am I sad?"

He stepped under the downpour and closed his eyes.

"Did I want to do it? Do I regret not doing it?"

He rinsed the shampoo out of his hair. He had run out of his own shampoo yesterday, and Josh had an extra bottle of his lying around. It smelled like apples.

"Do I want to still be here?"

That question swam throughout Tyler's brain as he rinsed the soap off his body. His eyes glanced over the smooth, pale, unmarked skin of his forearms and his hands twitched. Suddenly he was overcome with the desire to do  _something_. The thing he promised he would never do. The thing that promised to take away the pain for just a little bit. The thing that he had seen be the end of others.

His breathing sped up and he stumbled out of the shower.

"No," he whispered.

Tyler didn't know if he was answering his question or if he was refusing to do what his thoughts were telling him to, and if he was being honest, he didn't know which scared him more.

"Tyler?" a voice called out from his room. He still left his door unlocked, partly for the convenience for his friends, and partly because deep down, even though he would never admit it, he wanted someone to come in when he was at his weakest and help him.

"In the bathroom. I'll be out in a second," Tyler called back. He thanked whichever god was watching over him at that moment that his voice didn't come out as panicked and terrified as he felt. He pulled his clothes on and tried his hardest to lose the look of fear that was present in his eyes, but eventually he gave up.

"What's up?" Tyler asked as he walked into his room. Michael was sitting on the edge of his bed, hands fiddling with one of Tyler's tiny penguins.

"Are you doing okay?"

Tyler was a little startled by Michael's question. Sure, it was just a simple question that many people asked their friends or coworkers, or even strangers, multiple times a day, but the way that Michael said it, the way his eyebrows knitted together, the way he didn't look away when he asked it almost brought Tyler to tears.

"Uhm, yeah. I'm good. I'm doing good," Tyler replied.

_Lies_.

_Complete lies_.

_You should just tell him the truth, not that he'd believe you anyway. You have nothing to be sad about. He'd laugh in your face. He'd tell the whole school._

_Tyler Joseph. An anxious asshole who cares about his problems, and his problems only. What a great way to make more friends_.

"Okay. Just making sure."

Tyler smiled at Michael as he walked out his room. When the door shut, Tyler was about to sit down and ask himself why Michael was suddenly so talkative and caring towards him, when he heard voices in the hall.

"He said he was 'doing good'. I couldn't get him to say anything else," Michael explained to another person. Tyler quickly crossed his small dorm room and leaned against his door, trying to hear every word.

"Really? Nothing else?" Was that Josh?

"Nope."

"Oh, okay. Thanks anyways." That was Josh.

"No problem."

Tyler heard footsteps walk down the hallway and a door open and close. Josh sighed heavily and slumped against the wall right next to Tyler's door. After a few seconds, Tyler stepped away from his door and opened it slowly, poking his head out of it when the gap was big enough. Josh had the back of his head against the wall and his eyes were closed. Tyler took a deep breath and spoke gently.

"You can always ask me yourself, you know."

Josh sighed again and opened his eyes. He turned and looked at Tyler, studying his face.

"I know. Are you okay?"

"Yeah."

"You're not telling me the truth, are you?"

Tyler sighed. He figured there was no point in hiding all of the truth from Josh is he was asking other people to check up on him. "Nope."

"Will you ever?"

"Probably not."

"Then how will I know if you're okay? If you need my help?"

"You won't."

Josh sighed and closed his eyes again, resting his head back against the wall. Tyler stepped out of his room fully and leaned against the wall next to Josh.

"I worry about you, you know that, right?" Josh asked.

"I know," Tyler whispered.

"And you know that you can trust me?"

"I know."

" _Do_  you trust me?"

"Yes."

"And you still won't tell me?"

"I can't. I'm sorry," Tyler whispered, this time even more quietly than before.

Tyler felt so bad standing there and watching his friend look back at him with worry filled eyes. He felt bad that he couldn't tell him. He felt bad that he couldn't ask for help. He felt weak. He  _was_  weak. He was weak and he was sad and he was pitiful and he was worthless and he didn't deserve the friends he had and nothing ever went right for him and he was never happy and his life was a joke and he was going to die without any meaning and his demons would win the war he had already fought so hard not to lose.

But yet, he couldn't do anything to fix any of that, save for ending everything, but he couldn't do that. Not to his mom, not to his dad, not to his siblings or grandparents, and good  _God_  he could not do that to Josh.

"Okay," Josh replied.

"Okay?" Tyler had been expecting Josh to push more on the topic, but of course, Josh had to be the perfect human that he was and understand how Tyler felt without him ever saying anything.

"Yeah."


	14. Oh Honey

"And your father, your father told me the funniest thing the other day. He said something about ice cream. Oh darn, well now I can't remember it but it was really hilarious. Isn't your father hilarious?"

Tyler smiled. Sometimes he missed his parents, but then he would remember how miserable he was back home and suddenly the feeling was gone.

"Not too happy here, though, are you?" Tyler mumbled to himself.

"What was that, honey? I couldn't hear you," his mother spoke up from the other side of the phone. Tyler mentally slapped himself for thinking out loud again.

"Oh, I said how funny dad is," Tyler replied. His mom didn't need to know what he really said or the story behind it. If he told her the truth, to what he said or to moving far away or anything, even if he sugarcoated it, it would break her heart. Tyler might not appreciate being smothered by too much affection and pressure from her, but the last thing he ever wanted to do was hurt her. Sure the lies were painful, but they were nothing to the poison of the truth.

"Oh, isn't he? He said the darndest thing the other day. Oh, what was it?"

Tyler sat through another hour of his mother's small updates and stories about what his family was up to. His sister had apparently gone on a date a few weekends ago, and the guy had just taken her on a second one, even after he got The-Dating-My-Daughter speech from Tyler's dad. Everyone was shocked that his sister's boyfriend was still around, well, everyone but Tyler. His sister was great, and his dad? Not very intimidating.

"Oh, honey, I've got to go. Your father promised to take me to that organic market down just outside of the city. College is treating you well? Are you doing okay?"

"I'm doing great. College is awesome," Tyler lied through his teeth.

 _The truth hurts more_ , he chanted his head.  _The truth hurts more. Tell her what she needs to hear_.

"Oh, sweetie, that's fantastic! You know, your father and I are worried about you," his mother replied. Tyler's heart stopped for a second. He didn't want them to worry about him. He didn't need them to worry about him. He worried about himself and everything else enough as it was.

"I know. Have fun at the market, Mom."

"Okay, Ty. I'll talk to you later, honey. Are you going to come and visit us soon?"

"Sure, Mom."

"Okay, honey, Bye-bye!"

And with that the line dropped. Tyler sighed and stood up from the bench he was sitting on. He still didn't have any classes for the rest of the day, but he didn't want to be locked up in his room. With the thoughts that were running through his head right now, being alone wouldn't do anyone any good.

Tyler made his way over to the cafeteria, sent a text to Josh saying to meet him there when his class ended, and grabbed a plate of food. He found a table towards the back of the eating area and sat down in the chair that let him observe everyone from a safe distance. He didn't really want to talk to some stranger at the moment, but he also didn't want to be alone.

"Do you come here just to stare at your food? Because I think you can get the same effect from watching Food Network, and then you don't have to pay like, twenty one bucks for sub-par chicken."

Tyler's head snapped up at the sound of a voice, and he smiled when he realized that it was the blonde girl who had been talking.

"Do you mind if I sit with you?" she asked.

Tyler shook his head. "No, go ahead." For some reason he didn't mind her company.

"Thanks," she smiled. Tyler noticed that her nose scrunched up in a really cute way when she smiled. "You know, we've never actually introduced ourselves before, even after running into each other a few times."

Tyler blushed. Since the first day of school he had run into her, quite literally, two other times. And that one night they spent on the bench together. Tyler tired not to think about that night too much.

"I'm Jenna Black," she said.

"Tyler Joseph."

"Nice to officially meet you. Now tell me about your shirt. I don't think I've heard of that band before."

Tyler smiled and sat up straighter in his chair, telling Jenna about the band whose shirt he was wearing that he knew. They fell into a conversation about various types of music and the bands that they listened to, and even swapped numbers at some point before Jenna left so they could talk more. It was strange how everything about Tyler seemed to change the moment she started talking to him. Tyler didn't normally take to talking to strangers so easily, in fact, he usually avoid social contact with most people due to the anxiety it gave him, but Jenna wasn't exactly a stranger, and there was something else about her. Something different.

Tyler liked her.

"What's got you smiling? Get someone's number?" Josh joked as he sat down next to Tyler only ten minutes after Jenna left.

"Yes, actually. I did," Tyler said proudly.

"Sick," Josh replied. "So I was thinking about dying my hair."

"Yeah?" Tyler asked. "What color?"

"Maybe red. Or blue. I can't decide."

Tyler thought for a moment. "Blue. You'd look good in blue. But not like a bright blue. Kind of pale-ish."

"Yeah? That would look pretty sweet now that I think about it. Wanna help me dye it this weekend then?"

Tyler nodded. "Of course."

Josh smiled and then went on to tell Tyler about his day, Tyler commenting on something every now and then. For a second time that day Tyler forgot all about his problems that had slapped him in the face as soon as he woke up. It was weird.

"So you know Mark, right? The guy that always wears that red beanie and takes pictures of squirrels? I think you mentioned having a class with him?"

"Yeah, he's in my speech class."

"Oh, sweet. I met him in the library the other day and we were talking. He's having a party on Halloween and invited us," Josh said.

"Oh yeah, he was telling me about that this morning."

"Well do you wanna go?"

"I don't know. Everyone will be getting drunk, or high, or both. Plus like crowds and stuff and..." Tyler trailed off.

"Oh, true. We don't have to go, then."

Tyler sat for a moment and thought. He knew Josh probably really wanted to go, and wouldn't go if Tyler didn't. He also knew that he didn't get out and do things like that often. It might be good for him, despite his fear of large crowds and tight spaces.

"You know what, I'll go," he said eventually.

"Really? I don't want to pressure you or anything-,"

"No. It's cool. It'll be fun, right?"

"It'll be sick as frick," Josh smiled. "I can't wait."

"Neither can I."


	15. Too Too Too

Tyler stared down at his blue-stained hands. He wasn't cut out to be a hair stylist in the future.

 _Yet another thing you've failed at_ , he thought.  _Why don't you go try and paint something? Gotta keep the ball of failure rolling, don't we?_

Angrily he shut off the sink and set down the washcloth that he had been scrubbing his hands with. With a sigh he left his bathroom and collapsed onto his bed. This morning had been great. This week had been great, in fact. He had talked to Jenna more, and managed not to literally run into her again, he had finished an essay three days before it was due, and had beat a new video game with Josh on the first try. It had all been so great, so spectacular, so  _normal,_ that Tyler thought that maybe he was getting better. Maybe whatever had made its home in his head for the past eighteen years of his life had finally moved out. Maybe he would finally feel _happy_.

Oh, how wrong he had been.

It had started somewhere around noon. The dark thoughts rolled in like clouds and took their knives and daggers and dragged them across his mind. They bit and they stabbed and they twisted and they killed. It was painful and it was terrifying, and it took every ounce of Tyler's strength not to cry when his hands shook too much and got dye all over the place. Josh had said that it was cool, that that's what the towel was for, but to Tyler it was just another thing he couldn't do. It was the final blow in his fight against insanity.

Tyler let the tears fall down his cheeks at an alarming rate. All the frustration and pain and anger and loneliness and not enough not enough not enough  _too much_  came crashing down on him. He was drowning in the ocean of his mind and he couldn't swim to the surface. Something was holding onto his ankle and pulling him down deeper deeper further deeper. He couldn't breathe yet he was surrounded by air and it felt like his lungs were about to burst. The rate of his heart could beat the fastest engine in the world.

And the worst part was, it didn't stop. It just got worse. The voices grew louder louder meaner harsher louder too loud too loud too much  _too much_. Tyler couldn't even concentrate on a single sentence they were shouting at him.

_You should have done it when you she would never like someone like he just pities you he would never they wouldn't care if you never came home they're better off you should have done it when you you should have done it when you should have you should have you should-_

"I wish I did!" Tyler cried out. "I wish I did, I wish I did!"

_But you were too weak to do it, now weren't you? You're just full of empty promises these days._

"Shut up!" Tyler yelled. His voice was hoarse from crying. "Go away!"

_But then you'll be alone. Oh. Wait._

_You already are_.

Tyler wiped furiously at his tears and jumped out of his bed. He ran over to his foot locker and tried desperately to open it.

"Dammit!" he yelled. "God fucking dammit!"

Without the key he couldn't open the locker and get to what he desperately needed. What he wanted. What he craved.

_What you're scared of._

With a yell Tyler picked up one of the tiny penguin figurines and smashed it against his wall. It shattered instantly. He raced over and picked up one of the largest pieces.

_Do it. I dare you._

He held it close to his wrist and pushed down, but he didn't move it. His hands were shaking and tears blurred his vision.

 _Come on, you're almost there_.

Tyler gasped for another breath of air. His room was suddenly too hot and too small and  _not enough too much._

_You're almost there. It will be over before you know it even happened._

"No," Tyler whispered.

 _Don't be weak again, Tyler. Don't be weak_.

"No!" he yelled again. "I'm strong!"

Tyler dropped the ragged piece of penguin that was still clutched in his hand. He quickly moved away from the broken pile of pieces and sat on his hands.

"I'm strong!"

 _You're weak_.

"I'm strong! I didn't do it! I'm strong!" he yelled to himself.

_Weak, Tyler Joseph. That's all you'll ever be. Weak and_ **_worthless._ **

"No, I'm not. No," Tyler repeated. "I am not weak. I'm winning. I'm not weak."

 _Whatever helps you sleep at night, kid. Deep down you know how weak you really are_.

"I'm not weak," Tyler said to himself over and over before he fell asleep on the floor of his room. Every time he repeated it his voice shook a little bit more than the time before and the tears flowed a little faster. By the time he actually drifted off, Tyler didn't believe the words he had said to himself.

He was weak.

He was worthless.

He couldn't win.


	16. Strawberry Chickens

Tyler stared at the small bottle he held in his hands. All of the sudden everything felt so fragile; as if one small movement could break everything. He had decided that morning, after the penguin incident, that he wasn’t fit to fight off his demons alone. Since he couldn’t find it in him to open his mouth and cry out for help, he chose the next best option: sleeping pills.

“Tons of people need these,” Tyler told himself as he shook one out into his palm. “Doesn’t make you weak. Everyone needs to take medicine. Everyone needs some help. It’s normal.”

He swallowed the pill and chased it down with some leftover energy drink form earlier. He probably should’ve used water, but Tyler figured that his life was already messed up. One small thing such as this couldn’t make that much of a difference.

“And the list of things that I’ve done but shouldn’t have just gets longer,” he mumbled to himself.

He set the bottle on the shelf where one of the penguins used to be and switched off his lights. It was only around nine but Tyler thought that he might as well go to sleep now and see how much the pills help or not. Plus they were having a “pop-speech” in class the next day and Tyler thought it would be best to be awake and alert for that. 

As he laid there in the dark, Tyler’s mind began to wander. Shocker.

His eyes moved around his room, studying the shadows that objects from his shelves made on the walls and trying to read his posters in the dark. He listened to the sound of Ryan’s music, his neighbor and apparently wanna-be independent artist, and the steady beat of Josh practicing his drums from down the hall.

He thought about how everyone in his building had their own lives and their own thoughts and how weird it was that everyone was so independent yet they all depended on each other and how life was actually pretty confusing and not as black and white as everyone made it out to be. He thought about how he felt alone and how he really wasn’t but yet he was and how there were people here but they weren’t  _here_ and how all he wanted to do was  _talk_  to someone but no one would  _listen_  to what he said they would simply hear his words and never really understand what he was going through.

And that’s all he really needed, Tyler decided. He needed someone to  _listen_. He needed someone to  _understand_. He needed someone to hold his hand and not necessarily  _lead_  him but  _stay_  with him and be by his side and show him that things weren’t as bad as he thought. That things  _could_  get better. That they  _did_.

That’s all he needed.

Eventually Tyler’s eyes slipped shut and his breathing evened out and everything went quite around him. Ryan turned off his music and Josh sat down to write the essay he had been putting off for too long. All was quiet and and was well and Tyler's eyes slipped shut as he drifted off into a deep sleep.

When the morning came and Tyler’s alarm went off way too early for his liking, Tyler stumbled out of bed and actually, for once, felt rested. He was still tired as hell and wouldn’t have minded if by some miracle he was given three more hours of sleep, but his mind was empty. There was no regret to push through from events of the night prior, there was no pain in his hand where he might have punched a wall to stop himself from doing something, there was no guilt from knowing he let people down; there was nothing. There was only the remnants of the dream he had had last night that were quickly fading, leaving Tyler to wonder why he had been haring strawberries with bunnies and punk guitarists in the first place.

It was nice, Tyler decided. It was really, really nice. It was so nice that Tyler actually smiled genuinely back at Mark when he walked into class. He didn’t try to fake it or hide his feelings behind his some sort of mask.

“Did you sleep well last night?” Mark asked as the professor got his papers in order.

Tyler smiled again. “Yeah,” he replied. “Yeah, I did.”

“That’s great. Sleep is good,” Mark smiled. “You know, last night I had this really weird dream.”

“Really? Me, too.”

“That’s weird. Mine was about this chicken that stole all of my bracelets, which is weird since I don’t own any bracelets, and I was crying and the guy from the ticket booth at the movietheater down the street was laughing at me. It made zero sense,” Mark said. “What about yours?”

“I don’t even know,” Tyler replied. “I think I was sharing fruit with some dude from a band and a rabbit, but the guy was allergic to the fruit and then told me I had really pretty eyes before rolling down the hill we were sitting on.”

“What?”

“I don’t know.”

Tyler spent the rest of the day thanking the Lord that he went and bought the sleeping pills. He was awake for both his “pop-speech” and the calculus notes he took two hours later and he was still awake at nine that night when he was sitting with Josh in the library and trying to balance spoons on their noses.

Josh was convinced that he had a faulty spoon since his would fall shortly after he placed it on his nose, but Tyler just thought that he didn’t have the skill that it took to artfully balance silverware on one’s face.

“No, dude, you have do it- no. It’s gonna keep falling if you do it that way,” Tyler pointed out.

“No. I got this. I will balance the spoon,” Josh stated.

Tyler laughed. “Not like that you won’t.”

“Shut up, I’ve almost got it.”

“Sure you do.”

Tyler laughed even harder as Josh’s spoon fell, yet again, onto the table they were sitting at. Tyler’s spoon was still perfectly balanced on his nose. He wasn’t about to tell Josh that a little bit of spit could make the spoon stick better to the edge of his nose.

“I don’t understand you, Tyler Joseph,” Josh said as they caught their breath from laughing. Tyler removed his spoon from his face and looked at his friend with curiosity.

“What do you mean?”

Josh sighed. “One day you’re all quiet and sad looking, one day you’re shaking violently as if you’re your own landmass and you’re having an earthquake, and the next you sitting across from me laughing your ass off about spoons. I don’t get it.”

Tyler’s eyes fell to the table. He had hoped that he was getting better at hiding everything, but apparently not. That, or Josh as just really good at telling when things were wrong. Tyler wished that it was the second one. He didn’t need to add more things to his list of failures.

“What’s up,” Josh said when Tyler didn’t say anything.

“I-,” Tyler started. He didn’t know what to say. Sure, he trusted Josh with his life and would probably be the most comfortable telling him what was really going on, but Tyler couldn’t find the words. He couldn’t find the guts.

_Because you’re pathetic and scared and worthless._

_Because you know he doesn’t really care._

_No one can possibly care that much about you._

_Not even your parents care._

_Not even your siblings._

_No one cares._

_You'll be alone forever._

_You're a faliure, Tyler Joseph._

_A pathetic, useless faliure that can't even talk to his freinds._

_That can't cry out for help._

_That can't do **anything** right._

“I don’t know,” Tyler finally stuttered out. “I don’t know.”


	17. I'll Be Here

Tyler was in a daze. Everything around him seemed to be happening unbelievably slow yet fast at the same time. The minutes dragged on but suddenly Tyler was aware that he had been sitting in the same spot for two hours. He wasn’t sure at which point he had woke up, or decided to take a shower, but he found himself sitting at the fast food restaurant across the street from campus with dripping hair and a half eaten burger. He didn’t even know he had been hungry, or how he got there, or if he had told anyone where he was going.

The next thing he knew was that he was sitting in the bench from all those nights ago, watching cars pass through the intersection and students walking around from building to building. Was it a week day? Should he be in class? Why are those people wearing jackets? It is cold?

Tyler felt himself stand up and begin to walk back to his dorm. He didn’t know what time it was but he was aware that he was shivering.

_It must be cold,_  he thought.  _I should have worn a jacket._

Back in his room, Tyler sat on the edge of his bed. His fingers played with the sleeves of his long sleeved t-shirt. His wrists burned. His whole body burned. Every inch of his skin was on fire and every cell in his brain was yelling at him.

_Stupid! How could you be so stupid?! Why would you do that? You had tried so hard!_

Then another voice; this one darker and more threatening. It had a hint of pride and malice in its tone while it screamed over his other thoughts.

_But you wanted to. It felt good. You’re going to do it again._

“No,” Tyler said to himself. “I’m stronger than that.”

_No you’re not. Look at what you did last night._

Tyler’s eyes darted across the room, struggling to look somewhere, anywhere, other than his hands. They settled on the bottle of sleeping pills. If only he had taken them last night. If only he had remembered. If only if only if only….

“Tyler!”

There was a knock on his door. Tyler turned his face towards it. He thought about opening it. He came face to face with Josh. Apparently his body was listening to him. He put on a smile.

“Josh,” Tyler said.

“You ready for Mark’s party?”

“Yeah.”

That was hours ago, though. Tyler didn’t know how all that time had passed, but time seemed to be a foreign concept to him today. The only thing he was aware of was just how many times his wrists came into contact with something.

46 times.

Pain shot through his arm. He took another sip from the water bottle in his hands. Mark had lots of different drinks available. Tyler didn’t drink. He ran his hand through his hair.

47.

He vaguely remembered Josh running off to go convince one of the people from his art history class to write his essay for him. Apparently the guy was a happy drunk and agreed to anything. Tyler took another sip. More pain.

48.

Tyler also remembered having a conversation with Jenna. She had been here with a friend. Tyler didn’t remember her name, but who could blame him. Between trying not to blush around Jenna or have his sleeves fall down too much, Tyler had a lot on his mind. He wasn’t too sure of what they talked about, but he managed to make them laugh and keep on a convincing smile. That’s all that really matter to him.

 Tyler was in the middle of trying not to look at the corner of the room when Josh came up to him. Ryan was busy making out with someone who had a big forehead. Tyler didn’t know who it was, but hey, if the guy kept Ryan from trying to talk to Tyler about that weird book he had read, they could make out all night for all Tyler cared, as long as he didn’t have to see it.

“You having fun?” Josh asked when he walked up.

“Huh?” Tyler snapped out of his haze. Suddenly he heard the loud booming music and Mark’s distinguishable laugh. “Yeah.”

Tyler shifted in his spot against the wall, pinning one wrist under his hip. That counted for three times. The total tally for the number of times things touched his wrists was now up to 51.

“Dude, come on. Don’t lie to me,” Josh said. “I know that smile is fake.”

Immediately Tyler’s face fell. Everyone else had fallen for it.

“Why don’t you head on back to your dorm?” Josh suggested.

Tyler shifted on his feet. “I don’t really want to be alone tonight,” he mumbled.

“I’ll come with you the.”

“What? No. You’re having fun. I can handle myself. I’ll be okay.”

“Tyler, you’re not convincing anybody here. You sound on the edge of tears. Plus, watching our friends get drunk is only entertaining for so long,” Josh smiled. “Let’s go.”

“Okay,” Tyler whispered.

The two found themselves back in Tyler’s room, sitting on his bed and watching reruns of old TV shows. Tyler was still caught up in his own thoughts and was listening idly while Josh laughed and recounted storied from the party. Tyler didn’t even know that half of the people Josh ad mentioned had gone to Mark’s, or even knew him in the first place.

“You okay, man?” Josh asked when the credits for some show were scrolling across the screen. “You seem distant.”

Tyler nodded his head, then paused and shook it. Maybe it was time for him to open up to someone.

“What’s up?”

For a while, Tyler didn’t say anything. He just stared down at his wrists as the guilt and sadness built up in his stomach and brain. Suddenly, again, it was all too much and he felt like he couldn’t breathe He didn’t want to tell anyone, not even Josh, about this because saying it out loud was confirming what had happened. Saying it out loud made it clear to all that he was not okay. Saying it out loud was terrifying.

“You don’t have to say anything, you know that right? We can just sit here,” Josh said. The amount of times Tyler had shut down in the past few days was concerning Josh more and more. He would be fine one minute, then Josh would do so much as o to class or blink and Tyler would be gasping for air and telling everyone that  _really, I’m fine. Don’t worry about me._

Josh’s eyes looked down at Tyler’s hands. He recognized the hesitant brushes of fingertips against skin. The look of disgust and disappointment that flashed across Tyler’s face every other second. He recognized it all. He had been in the same position not too long ago. Josh took a deep breath.

“A few years back, I wasn’t the happiest kid around,” Josh started. Tyler kept looking at his hands. “No one really talked to me except for my parents and I felt forgotten. I felt alone. The kids at school didn’t like me, God knows why, and praying just wasn’t helping me anymore. My one safety net was gone. I was angry and upset and I didn’t know why. I took it out on myself.”

Josh paused and took another deep breath. It had been a long time since he told anyone about this.

“For three years, most of my high school life, I hid underneath jackets and hoodies and long pants,” Josh continued. “I told everyone I was always cold. They believed it. I don’t know why they did, though; I’m a pretty bad liar.”

Josh held one of his arms out in front of him and Tyler. Most of the marks had faded but some were still there. A sad, knowing look flashed across Tyler’s face, almost too quick for Josh to tell if he had even seen anything.

“But that’s not the point. The point that I’m trying to make is that it doesn’t make you weak. I don’t know if you’re in the same boat as me or not, but please know that doing that doesn’t make you weak. You aren’t giving into anything. You’re surviving. You’re still here. You’re alive. That’s what matters. It took me a long time to realize that.”

Tyler’s breathing had calmed down and his moved his head so that his eyes met Josh’s.

“Again, I don’t really know what’s going on with you, and I’m sorry if I’m over stepping any boundaries, but I care about you and I’ve noticed that you aren’t as okay as you’ve been letting on. And it’s okay not to be okay. That fine. That’s great, actually. It’s normal. But sometimes keeping it all in isn’t safe. Sometimes you need to tell someone, even if it’s just a little bit, because getting help is important. And the person you tell may or may not be me or anyone in your family, but no matter what they’re always going to be there for you. I’m always going to be there for you.”

Tyler opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out.

“You don’t have to say anything right now. You don’t ever have to say anything. But if one day you want to or need to, I’ll be here. And if that day never comes, then so be it. I just want you to know that I’m here.”

The room filled with silence as Josh’s words faded away. A tear slid down Tyler’s cheek and he felt as though he was going to burst. Years upon years of feeling excluded and forgotten and angry and upset and Josh was the first one to notice and to show that he noticed and cared and it was all too much for Tyler but in a good way. In the way that he felt loved and cared for and as if he had known Josh his whole life even though it had barely been two months.

Tyler didn’t say a word as he buried his face into Josh’s shoulder and cried. Josh didn’t say a word as he quietly comforted his friend. He didn’t comment on the bit of skin that was raw and red that peeked out from under Tyler’s sleeve. Josh wasn’t going to say anything about them. He knew that’s not what Tyler needed. Right now, he just needed a hug.


	18. Damp Clothes And Dinner Plans

The sun was high in the sky by the time Tyler woke up. He got out from under his sheets and rubbed his eyes. Josh must have stayed put him to bed after Tyler cried himself to sleep. Tyler still didn’t know how he had been so lucky as to run into the strange, always-smiling mow hawked guy all those days back.

When he got into his bathroom, Tyler noticed that there was a shopping bag on the counter; one that he certainly had not put there. He didn’t even shop at the pharmacy that it had come from. Puzzled, Tyler went over and opened it. Inside he found a box of bandages and a bottle of disinfectant for small scrapes and wounds. Something inside Tyler’s chest twisted and tightened. His breath caught in his throat because _oh God, someone knew_. But then a small sigh escaped his lips because oh God, someone _cared_.

Tyler stepped into the shower and turned on the spray. It was a good two minutes of standing under the flow of water that Tyler realized that normal people don’t shower while still fully clothed. He cursed at himself while he peeled off the soaking articles of clothing and set them on the floor of the shower.

“Get a hold of yourself,” Tyler mumbled.

Once he was dried off and dressed for the day, Tyler went back into his bathroom and stared at the shopping bag. He was hesitant with his movements as he pushed up his sleeves and cleaned off his wrists. After wrapping his fore arms with the bandages, Tyler pulled his sleeves back down and over his hands. A small, sad smile slipped onto his face.

Tyler headed over to Josh’s room after that. He found his friend sitting at his desk talking to someone over Skype.

“Oh, Mom,” Josh said as Tyler walked into his room. “I want you to meet Tyler.”

Josh waved his hands furiously at Tyler to get him to join him in front of the screen. A lady around the same age as his own mother was smiling back at him and Josh.

“Oh, Tyler! How wonderful to meet you!” the lady exclaimed. “I’m Josh’s mother. He’s told me so much about you!”

At her statement both boys blushed. Josh because his mom was just a tad embarrassing at some points, and Tyler because it had been a while since someone had ever been a close enough friends with him that they told their mother about him.

“Josh was telling me about how your family lives in Columbus, too, and I thought it would be a wonderful idea for us all to have Thanksgiving dinner together. Would that be something your family would enjoy, Tyler?”

Tyler smiled. “I’m sure my mom would be ecstatic. She’s always looking for other people to try her pies.”

“Well then that’s settled then,” Mrs. Dun stated. “You boys can come back home together and we’ll all have a great time.”

Tyler looked over at Josh, who smiled back at him.

“My mom likes meeting my friends,” he explained.

Tyler only smiled in response.

Forty minutes and two embarrassing stories from Josh’s childhood later, the two boys said goodbye to Mrs. Dun and promised to look out for each other before setting off in search of food. They ended up back at the restaurant that had the macaroni and cheese _and_ bacon on the hamburgers.

“You sure you’re cool with spending Thanksgiving with my family?” Josh asked between mouthfuls or fries.

“Yeah, why not,” Tyler replied. “It sounds fun.”

“Sweet,” Josh smiled. “Also, I’ll need your help dying my hair again before we go home.”

“How come? I love the blue.”

“Me too, but my mom doesn’t. She just finished reprimanding me for it when you came in. She says it should be something a bit more “manly” or whatever.”

“So you’re gonna dye it black or something?” Tyler asked.

Josh laughed. “Nope. I’m going pink.”

Tyler laughed as well.

When the day ended and yet more videogames had been beaten by the unconquerable pair, Tyler and Josh parted ways, which was really just Tyler leaving Josh’s room to head back to his so he would have a comfortable place to sleep.

“Oh, and Josh,” Tyler called out when he was halfway through the door.

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

Josh cocked his head to the side. “What for?”

“For,” Tyler started. “Just for everything. Thanks.”

Josh smiled. He knew what Tyler was thanking him for. For leaving the party. For letting him cry. For being there for him. Fore listening. For buying the bandages. For everything. He knew what Tyler was trying to say, but he didn’t want to let it on that he knew. Josh knew that Tyler didn’t need someone else to be a constant vocal reminder of his problems; Tyler did that enough himself. Tyler needed someone who would help from a distance. Someone who would keep an eye on him. Someone who would be there for him. Josh knew that. It’s exactly what he had needed all those years ago himself.

“No problem,” Josh said.

Back in his room Tyler changed into his pajamas and climbed back into his bed. He took the bottle of pills off of his shelf and took two, placing it back on the empty space where the two tiny penguins had been.  The second had joined the first; smashed and broken in a fit of rage, but the second had another color joining the conventional black and white of a penguin’s coat. A color that reminded many of anger and roses. A color that flows through veins.

That night, unlike the two nights prior, Tyler didn’t dream. The nightmares and shadows and friendly faces crying did not dance around in his mind as he slept. Instead he saw the comforting empty abyss that had escaped his dreams throughout his childhood. He saw the wonderfully complex nothingness that he had craved for so long to see when he closed his eyes.

Maybe it was because for once he knew that someone cared, and cared enough to make sure that he was safe even when he was destroying himself, and that someone understood and listened to him and would always be there for him, but that night Tyler went to sleep wanting to wake up the next morning.


	19. Watch It Burn

It wasn’t even noon yet and Tyler had had to escape his family. He loved them to pieces, but their constant questions about his future and never ceasing states of happiness was taking its toll. How come they could all be so carefree? How come they didn’t stop every moment and think about how that one small decision could change everything? How could they be content with what life they had and continue to live it even though there are so many terrifying things in the future?

Oh, yeah. That’s right. It’s because they were  _normal_.

Because they were something Tyler could never be, no matter how hard he tried.

So that’s why he had to escape. That’s why he came to the tree house, no wait,  _his_  tree house. He needed to get away. He needed to clear his head, he needed to get rid of the match he was holding?

Tyler stared at the small piece of wood in his hand. He didn’t know why he had it or where he got it, but it didn’t really concern him. It felt normal to have it dancing between his fingers. It felt normal to sit among the canopy of trees and bundles of leaves, all of which were very capable of burning, and play with something that started fires.

Suddenly the air was full of smoke. Tyler stood up and realized that he wasn’t holding the match anymore.

He had dropped the match and  _everything was burning._

Tyler knew he should run. He knew he should get out of the trees and call for help, but he couldn’t move. His favorite place in the entire world was going up in flames and he wasn’t able to move a single inch. All he could do was stand there and watch everything burn around him. It was hot, it was dark, and it was terrifying, yet all Tyler did was repeat one word over and over. One word that he hoped would reach his parents ears. One word that he hoped would fix everything when it was over.

_“I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry! I didn’t mean it! I’m sorry!”_

“Tyler!”

His eyes shot open.

He was in his dorm room. Josh was standing over him with a worried look on his face. There was light shining in through his window. His heart was beating way too fast. There was no fire. There was no tree house. Tyler breathed a sigh of relief and covered his face with his hands.

Everything was okay.

“Tyler, man, are you okay?” Josh asked him. “And don’t give me some lame excuse.”

“I, uhm, yeah. Now, I mean,” Tyler struggled to form a single sentence. “It was a dream. Just a dream.”

“What was it about?” Josh sat down on Tyler’s bed next to him. “I mean you were screaming, so it must have been pretty bad.”

“It was.”

“Do you wanna talk about it?” Josh asked hesitantly. He knew how Tyler liked to keep things to himself. He knew that Tyler never shared much. That knowledge wasn’t going to stop him from asking, though.

“Y- yeah,” Tyler stuttered.

Josh looked at him with slightly wide eyes. He hadn’t been expecting Tyler to agree to talking about something so personal. Over the past few weeks he had noticed how on edge Tyler had been. Maybe it was the fact that exams had just passed or the fact that they were going home to visit their families that sparked the worst of Tyler’s anxieties, but no matter what it was, it was driving him up the wall with fidgeting hands and unsteady breaths. Josh had been worried, of course, and every chance he got, he snuck a look at Tyler’s arms.

He never saw anything new.

“I was, uh, at home. With my family,” Tyler began. “I don’t know where you were, you weren’t in it, but I was at my tree house. I was alone, and I had a match?”

Tyler paused and a confused look slipped onto his face, replacing the panic that had been there moments before. Josh nodded for him to continue.

“And, and I was playing with the match. Like, between my fingers, and then all of the sudden, everything was burning,” Tyler said quietly. “The tree house, the trees, everything. Everything was burning.  _I_  was burning.”

“Oh, Ty,” Josh consoled. “But it wasn’t real. None of that happened. It’s okay.”

“I’m sorry,” Tyler whispered.  He was staring off into the distance and his eyes were glossing over with tears.

“I know you are, Ty. I know,” Josh said. “But if we’re going to get to the hotel before midnight, we have to leave now.”

Tyler snapped out of his thoughts and shook his head, the look of confusion never leaving his face. “Yeah, yeah of course.”

Originally, the two had planned to leave for home two days before Thanksgiving, filling both of those days with just driving, but after Josh noticed how strung up about everything Tyler had been, he suggested they leave as soon as their break started and spend a few days at the inn Tyler had stayed at on his way to college. Tyler had promptly agreed, partly because he loved the trees he had seen there and figured that now would be his chance to climb them since climbing with a friend is more always safer, and partly because he really did need a break, though he would never admit it.

An hour later, the two were on the highway. Josh had offered to drive first, so Tyler sat in the passenger’s side and stared out the window, trying to block out the fact that there was no music to drown out his thoughts.

_The fire, the flames, the burning, the pain pain pain pain, your fault **all your fault, Tyler.**_

“Hm?” Tyler asked. Josh was glancing over at him as if expecting an answer to a question.

“I said, do you want to put on some music?” Josh repeated.

“Oh, yeah,” Tyler replied. He plugged his phone into Josh’s car and chose a song that he knew they both liked. He smiled to himself as the beat of the drums rattled his chest and the melodies swam around in his head, making peace with and silencing the violent thoughts of  _fire flames fire pain your fault, Tyler, your fault._

Josh was singing along and tapping out the beat on the steering wheel when they pulled into the Forest Inn. They had switched off driving only once, but after Tyler fell asleep in the passenger’s seat for the second time, Josh figured that it would be best to let him be. Who knows how much sleep he actually got with that nightmare?

“Tyler, time to go in,” Josh said as he shook his shoulder.

“Hm? We’re there?”

“Yeah.”

Tyler stumbled out of the car and grabbed his backpack, following Josh inside. The lady behind the counter was the same one that Tyler had met before, and when she saw him, she recognized him immediately.

“Well, hello there!” she greeted them. “Welcome back! You brought a friend this time, I see!”

Tyler blushed and hung his head slightly. “Yeah.”

“Now, will that be one room or two rooms?”

Tyler was about to say something, but Josh spoke up. “If you have a room with two separate beds that would be great.”

“Oh of course!”

Tyler and Josh found themselves in a room much like the one Tyler had stayed in before, but this one had two beds instead of one and none of the floral patterns matched. Still, the tow found it oddly charming.

The rest of the night was spent calling mothers and siblings and telling them that they would be there soon, and playing games online while eating the poptarts and energy bars that they had packed. When they finally decided to call it a night, they turned out the lights. Tyler took his sleeping pills and prayed and hoped that the rest of the night would be filled with nothing but the peaceful sounds of crickets chirping outside the inn.

For once, he actually got what he wanted.

 


	20. Everything I Adore

It was cold outside, but not cold enough to deter the two friends from sitting outside on the patio to eat their breakfast. Everyone else who was staying at the Forest Inn had sat inside, but the noise of their laughs and hearty conversations flowed outside and reached Josh’s and Tyler’s ears.

“So you wanted to see if they had a hair place around here, right?” Tyler asked. He took another bite of bacon.

“Yeah, if you don’t mind. I figured that since we have some time I might as well get my hair done professionally and whatnot,” Josh replied.

“I don’t mind at all,” Tyler said. “You still gonna go for pink?”

Josh smiled. “You bet. Maybe even neon pink. Like a highlighter.”

“You would be the one who could pull it off,” Tyler laughed.

“I think you’re supposed to cut your hair, not pull it, but whatever floats your boat, man,” Josh joked.

Tyler laughed a bit harder. “Dork.”

“You know it.”

After they finished their breakfast, the two walked to the main street of the small town and looked in a few of the shops. Eventually they stumbled upon a place that said they would dye Josh’s hair for a low price. They were only a little shocked at his choice of color.

“Do you mind if I stop by next door for a moment? I wanted to see if there was anything I could get my mom,” Tyler asked Josh as the hairstylist prepared his station.

Josh looked around hesitantly and fiddled with his fingers. He seemed on edge.

“Or I could wait with you until you’re done,” Tyler added quickly. He knew that Josh was generally uncomfortable in new places surrounded by people he didn’t know. He had hidden away for the first few weeks of school and only really talked to other people when he absolutely needed to. Tyler, of course, hadn’t questioned it.

Josh broke out into a smile. “Yeah, if you could.”

Tyler smiled back. “No problem, dude.”

Tyler took a seat next to Josh’s chair and watched as the hairstylist bleached and then died Josh’s hair. For a moment Tyler was tempted to dye his hair as well, but he was unsure of how good he would look with bright purple hair. He would leave the dyeing to Josh.

When Josh’s hair was sufficiently pink, the two went to the small gift shop next door. In the Joseph family, there was a tradition that everyone bought a Christmas tree ornament and set them in the center of the table during Thanksgiving. No one was really sure of how it started, but they all did it. Tyler thought it was sweet.

“What about this one?” Tyler asked as he held up a delicate, silver reindeer. He had always wanted a reindeer as a pet when he was younger, but his parents were quick to tell him how unrealistic that would be. Surprisingly, they were more supportive of his dream to become a lion.

“I think that one’s pretty sick,” Josh commented. “I always wanted a reindeer as a pet.”

“Dude!” Tyler exclaimed. “Me too!”

Tyler ended up buying the small ornament for his mom. Josh bought something as well, but Tyler didn’t really know why he did. Who needed a rainbow dinosaur that sang the national anthem?

They ended up back at the inn, wandering around in the forest behind it. The trees were beautiful and the afternoon sun created intricate patterns all along the forest floor. Some of the trees were so thick that Tyler and Josh couldn’t wrap their arms around them all the way, even when they did it together. Tyler had never felt so peaceful before in his life, not even in his own tree house.

Josh shared Tyler’s wonder as they walked deeper and deeper into the forest. It was as if they were the first people in years to traverse back that deep. Not a single rock had been upturned before and small animals hid amongst the leaves as if they hadn’t ever seen a human in their life.

While walking around, Tyler’s eyes landed on a tree. The tree was tall and thick and looked to be older than any of the other trees that surrounded it. Its branches hung low to the ground; the perfect height to grab onto.

Tyler walked over to it with Josh not too far behind. It only took them about ten minutes to climb to a height that wasn’t too far up in the branches.

“Have you ever just like,” Tyler spoke out into the trees, “squinted your eyes and looked at what’s around you?”

Josh shook his head. He closed his eyes just enough so that his eyelashes blurred everything around the edges. Nothing seemed to be in focus and the rays of light became elongated and distorted the rest of what he saw. Josh had never thought to look at the world like this.

“Why does everything look all different?” Josh asked.

“Don’t know,” Tyler replied. They were barely speaking above a whisper. “But I find that when I look at things this way, afterwards I always see everything else differently. Like, I see the way I live my life and who I am and who other people are.”

Josh opened his eyes all the way and looked around. Tyler’s eyes were completely closed and he was sitting with his back against the trunk of the tree. For the first time in weeks Tyler looked relaxed. It was as if Josh could see every wave of anxiety melt off of him and fall away to the ground. He suddenly understood why Tyler preferred to sit alone sometimes in the middle of the trees.

They stayed in the tree for the remainder of the day; trading jokes and philosophical views as the sun slowly set. Josh had known that Tyler was poetic and quite funny, but never before had he been so moved by something a person said immediately after a fart joke.

When they got back to their room, Tyler collapsed onto his bed.

“You okay?” Josh asked.

“Yeah,” Tyler said. He didn’t feel a pang of guilt after he said that. He didn’t have to regret lying straight to Josh’s face. He didn’t even have to hide his face when he spoke. He was okay. He really was.


	21. Can't Go Home

They started driving again around noon the next day. Tyler was in the driver’s seat, leaving josh in charge of the music. They sang loudly and obnoxiously as they went down the highway, neither caring who, if anyone heard them.

As the night grew nearer and the shadows grew taller, Tyler suddenly began to feel the waves of anxiety wash up on the shore of his brain. He felt so immensely alone and he slowly he began to panic. He couldn’t go home, what was he thinking? He had tried so hard for years to leave, and now he was waltzing up to their front doorstep. He loved his family, he loved them so, so much, but he felt so inadequate there. He felt alienated. He felt forgotten.

Everyone else at home was better than him. They all had something they were good at. They all had something that made them happy, and then there was Tyler. The shy, quiet kid that filled up pages of his school notebooks with harsh lyrics instead of notes and the kid that locked himself in his room because he couldn’t stand being around anyone else with their accomplishments, making him feel like a failure.

“I need to pull over,” Tyler whispered. He was short of breath and his hands were shaking, making it hard to concentrate on the road and control the steering wheel.

“Are you okay?” Josh asked. He had been slowly drifting off to sleep, but now he was fully alert.

“No,” Tyler choked out. He pulled the car into the shoulder of the road and turned on the lights. He rested he head on his hands and took deep, heavy breaths.

“Talk to me,” Josh said.

“I can’t,” Tyler tried to speak. “I can’t go back home. I’ll drop you of at your place and then go stay in a hotel. I just, I can’t do this.”

“Why not?”

“They’re gonna ask questions, Josh,” Tyler explained. “Questions I can’t answer.”

_Why are you so skinny now?_

_Why do you only wear long sleeves?_

_Have you decided what you want to do with your life?_

_How come you don’t call us as much anymore?_

_Are you dating anyone?_

_Why were you so eager to leave?_

_Why are you still so quiet?_

“Hey, hey, hey,” Josh said. He reached over and wrapped Tyler hands in his. They were shaking. “It’s going to be okay.”

“No, it’s not!” Tyler cried.

“I’m sure they still love and care about you, even if you can’t answer their questions.”

“But that’s the thing. They love and care about who they think I am. I’ve hidden so much from them; they don’t know a thing about me. They think I’m some happy go lucky guy that never stops smiling. Do you know how draining it is to pretend to be that all day? Do you know how much it hurts to have to hide from your own family?”

“Tyler, please,” Josh pleaded. “Please calm down. You’re going to give yourself a panic attack.”

Tyler laughed. “What’s one more, huh? What’s one more.”

Josh sighed and shook his head. He wished more than anything that there was something he could do for Tyler. He was so confused and angry and upset and all Josh wanted to do was help, but neither knew how he could.

“Look, whatever happens, I’ll be right by your side, okay? I’ll be right there. You can do it.”

Tyler took a deep breath and opened his eyes. He looked over a Josh, who was looking back at him.

 _If Josh thinks I can do it, then I can_ , Tyler thought.  _I can do it._

“Yeah,” Tyler eventually said. “Yeah I can.”

Josh smiled. “How about you let me drive us the rest of the way.”

“Okay.”

A few hours later they pulled into Tyler’s neighborhood. Tyler was slow at gathering his bag. As much as he didn’t want to go inside, he knew he had to.

“Hey,” Josh said before he could close the door. “If you need anything, just call me. I’ll come pick you up, okay? You just need to make it through the night. You can do.”

Tyler smiled back at Josh. “Thanks.”

Tyler closed the door and josh drove off down the street. When Tyler couldn’t see the car anymore, he turned and faced his house.

“Here goes nothing,” he mumbled to himself.

He knocked on the door with a shaking hand and tried to calm his breathing. They’re his family. Just his family. He could do this.

No you can’t.

Tyler couldn’t even force that thought out of his mind before the door in front of him opened and his sister threw her arms around him.

“I’ve missed you so much,” she mumbled into his shoulder.

Tyler cracked a smile. Sometimes he forgot how much she actually cared.

“I’ve missed you, too.”

His sister pulled him through the door and into the living room, where he was met by more bone crushing hugs. His brother’s refused to let go of him and his father had to fight his way in. A tear fell down Tyler’s face, but he quickly wiped it away.

It was two ore hours before Tyler finally broke away from his family. He told them they had been traveling all day and he needed to rest, but that was only half true. He had been around the same few quiet people for so long that the sudden swarm of moving mouths and loud voice was a bit too much for him to handle. He felt lucky to have escaped before the onslaught of questions came. One emotional breakdown was enough for him.

Tyler changed into a pair of pajamas and replied to a text from Josh, asking him if everything went okay and reminding him that he would see him again tomorrow. Tyler didn’t know what he would do without Josh.

When he flipped off the lights, Tyler laid down in his old bed. It was different from the one in his dorm, and not in a good way. It reminded him of the multiple nights where he cried himself to sleep and hid beneath the covers waiting for the morning to come. His room had been his only safe haven as a kid, but the loneliness that came with it had been his enemy.

Tyler thought back to a conversation he and Josh had had only a few nights ago. Josh had told Tyler that when he felt alone at night, to picture the hall of their dorm building and notice all of the doors and remember that each door had someone behind them. Then think about how many families the people behind those doors belonged to. Josh told Tyler to think about all of that and remember that even if he felt alone, there was always someone else to close to him. That there was always someone else thinking the same things as him. That no matter what was going on, he was never alone.

 

Tyler fell asleep that night without the help of the sleeping pills.


	22. Thanks

Tyler sat stiffly at the table. A plethora of plates filled with different kinds of food were spread out in front of him. To his right, his mother was engaged in a conversation with Mrs. Dun, and to his left his sister was laughing at a joke their father had just told. Across from Tyler, Josh was sitting in equal silence; the only difference between his and Tyler’s behavior was that Josh kept looking up from his plate to check on Tyler while Tyler kept his eyes cast downwards as he pushed his food around his plate.

Off in the distance, a question was asked and a familiar voice replied. It sounded muffled and confusing to Tyler’s ears. He was too lost in his own mind to pay attention to anything else.

“And you, Tyler?”

Tyler snapped out of his thoughts at the sound of his name. Everyone at the table had their eyes on him, causing his heart beat to speed up.

“Uhm,” Tyler mumbled.

“What do you want to do for the rest of your life?” Mrs. Dun asked.

_I don’t know._

Tyler looked to Josh in a panic. This was the kind of question he was scared of.

“Tyler was telling me the other day how he knew a guy that was going into, uh, what was it again?” Josh spoke up. His eyes were locked with Tyler’s with a look that was telling him to lie.

“Technical theater,” Tyler mumbled.

“Yeah, that, and he said that it sounded pretty interesting, right?”

“Yeah.” Tyler’s eyes moved back down to his plate.

“Oh, well that sounds delightful!” Mrs. Dun replied.

Tyler gave a small kind of smile and forced himself to meet her eyes. She returned the smile and turned back to face Tyler’s mother and continue another conversation. Tyler’s heart was still beating way too fast to be healthy, but the look on Josh’s face told Tyler’s that everything was going to be okay and everything was okay.

After dinner, Josh and Tyler found themselves in the Dun’s backyard, sitting on the swing set that no one had bothered to ever take down. The outside air was cold, but not enough so that they needed more than a light jacket. Tyler’s heart rate had finally slowed down back to normal and a feeling of pride was spreading throughout him. He had made it through a day at his house and a dinner with another family. He felt invincible.

“You okay?” Josh asked.

“Yeah,” Tyler replied.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.”

Tyler nodded his head. His thoughts had been pretty loud the whole day, but for once he found it easier to ignore them. He thought it might have something to do with being near his family again, but that wasn’t enough evidence to convince him to move back closer to home.

“When I was younger, my dad used to play out here with me all the time,” Josh said after a few minutes of silence. “One time my mom called him in for some reason and he told me to wait, so I sat down on the grass and didn’t move an inch. I guess they thought that I would eventually come back inside when I realized that whatever they were doing was taking too long, but I stayed put for about two hours.”

Tyler laughed a bit. “Really?”

Josh smiled. “Yeah.”

“Why the sudden childhood stories?”

“Well, I know how pressured you feel at home and how you feel that everyone expects you to stay around here, but I just want you to know that sometimes it’s okay to leave,” Josh explained. “I mean, I wasted hours sitting in that one spot. I got nothing from it and I could have been doing so many other things, but I felt the need to stay. Maybe staying near home isn’t what you need, and that’s okay.”

Tyler thought about Josh’s words for a few seconds and then smiled. “How did you know I needed to hear that?”

“I can read minds,” Josh joked. “I don’t really know, I was just guessing. It seemed like you needed something.”

“Well, thanks.”

“Anytime.”

They spent another hour outside talking about cats and videogames until their parents called them in.

“It’s getting too cold out here!” Josh’s mother called.

“You two are going to get sick!” Tyler’s mother added.

The two trudged back inside and joined the others in the living room.  Stories from their parents’ college lives were buzzing through the air and laughter rang through the halls. Plans for the two boys to come back up during their winter break were made and phone numbers were swapped. It was a picture perfect holiday scene filled with smiling faces and genuinely kind words. Tyler had never felt so at peace with his own family and some complete strangers ever before.

When it was growing to be too late, the Joseph family piled into their car and drove back home. Tyler bid his family good night and headed up to his room. Reverting back to his old habits, Tyler grabbed an energy drink from the fridge on his way and pulled out his laptop.

He ended up filling ten pages in a new word document with complicated rhymes and his personal outlooks on life. When he was in the middle of mindlessly browsing the internet, Tyler’s eyes closed for the hundredth time, but this time they stayed shut.


	23. Hesitant Texts

Two days, one hotel night, 12 rest stops, and around 30 energy drinks later, Tyler and Josh pulled into the parking lot near their dorm building just after noon on Sunday. After putting away everything they took with them on their short road trip back home. The two friends found themselves sitting in the lounge room at the end of the hallway in their dorm. Michael, who was sat at the table in the corner with an abandoned painting on front of him, was involved in a heated discussion about some sort of band thing, from what Tyler could guess, with his older brother and a shorter guy with tons of tattoos whom Tyler had never seen before.

Across the room, snuggled up in the couch, was Tyler’s neighbor Ryan and the guy who he had been kissing at Mark’s party.  They were both nice enough to Tyler, and the other guy could sing really well, but there were some things that Tyler never wanted to hear come out of anyone’s moth late at night. Ryan and the guy reminded Tyler of the couple at the Forest Inn the first time he had stayed there.

Tyler sighed and looked up at the TV that was mounted on the wall in front of the couch he and Josh were sat on. Someone in the hall had brought out a gaming system and the whole building made it their mission to beat the high score that was previously on the game. So far Tyler was in fifth place, while Josh and the guy from upstairs, who no one had ever heard say a word, kept switching between first and second place.

The figures on the screen danced before Tyler’s eyes and the color’s blurred together. In the background he heard Michael animatedly explaining why a certain amp was crucial to the success of their unformed band mixed with puke-ably cute sweet nothings whispered between the couple on the couch. Tyler sat still and let everything happen around him. Sometimes he liked the disconnected feeling that watching others go about their daily lives gave him. It made him feel slightly less human and made it easier to forget about his problems for just a little while longer.

“Hey, Ty,” Josh’s voice broke into Tyler’s thought, “do you still have that alpaca game?”

Josh was now sitting upside down on the couch, with his head where feet should go and his legs dangling over the back of the couch.

“”It’s not really a game, but yeah,” Tyler replied.

“Can I play it?” Josh was already reaching for Tyler’s phone, which sat on the cushion between the two of them.

“Sure,” Tyler said. He would never understand Josh’s strange love for the, quite possibly weirdest, game Tyler had. “Just don’t open that text.”

Josh looked down at the screen and furrowed his eyebrows.

“Why don’t you want to talk to Jenna?” he asked.

Tyler sighed and rubbed his hands with his face. He had been doing that a lot lately. The opening music of the alpaca game filled Tyler’s ears.

“It’s not that I don’t want to talk to her, because trust me, I really do,” Tyler eventually said. “I just don’t know what to say, you know? And I really, really like her and I kind of want something more with her, and I’m pretty sure she wants to be more than just friends, too, but I don’t know if I’m ready for anything.”

For the past few weeks, Tyler had been texting Jenna almost nonstop. They even met up a few times in the library to study, even though they didn’t have a single class that was the same. Tyler already knew that he cared for her more than he did for other people, and she was one of the only people besides josh that managed to make him smile every now and then, but Tyler didn’t know if he was right for her. If he was good enough.

_You’re not good enough for anyone, Tyler Joseph._

_You’re going to die alone._

“I can barely even take care of myself,” Tyler whispered.

Josh righted himself on the couch and locked Tyler’s phone, a frown set on his face.

“There’s nothing wrong with thinking that, you know. It’s normal,” Josh spoke up. Tyler didn’t reply. “Have you told her any of that?”

Tyler looked down at his lap. “No. I don’t want her to think that I’m lame.”

“Nonsense.”

“But what if I tell her all that and she doesn’t ever want to see me again? I don’t want to lose her.”

“She won’t,” Josh reassured him. “And if she does, well then you know that a relationship wouldn’t have worked out anyway. But from what I know of Jenna, she will respect your feelings and understand everything completely.”

Tyler looked up at Josh. “You sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

Tyler’s phone went off and Jenna’s name flashed up on the screen. Tyler picked up his phone and read it.

“She wants to hang out today,” Tyler told josh.

“Well, do you want to?”

Tyler nodded.

“Ask her to dinner,” Josh said. “You can tell her everything then.”

Tyler looked hesitant as he typed out his reply. He had never been very good with the whole “liking people” thing. If there was a wrong thing to do, Tyler probably did it at some time before.

Eventually though, Tyler did hit send. Josh patted him on the shoulder, telling him that everything was going to be okay. Tyler allowed himself to smile a bit, but it vanished when Jenna replied.

**Jenna:**  7 sounds great. I have to tell you something important anyways.


	24. Hate Is A Strong Word

Tyler was pacing the length of his room. His new black jeans, which he had been saving to wear for a special occasion, were bunching awkwardly at his knees from the constant standing up ad sitting down that he was doing in between laps across his room. His hesitant fingers fiddled with the bottom button of his white shirt. Josh sat on Tyler's bed with a worried and concerned expression chiseled into his face. Every now and then Josh would open his mouth as if to say something, but he would immediately snap it shut. He didn't think there was anything he could say to Tyler to calm him down.

Inside Tyler's head his thoughts were racing a mile a minute. They had been slowing down progressively over the days, but ever since Jenna sent that text, his thoughts turned into bees and the buzzing didn't seem like it would stop anytime soon.

_What if she hates me?_

_Shut up, you already know that she does._

_But now she's going to say it to my face._

_It was bound to happen someday, kid._

_What if I mess everything up?_

_You're going to. You always do. Why would this time be any different?_

"Josh, I can't do this," Tyler muttered desperately for the twelfth time.

Josh reached out and took ahold of Tyler's hand as he walked past the bed. Josh closed his own hand around Tyler's and made him stop walking to take a deep breath.

"Yes, you can Tyler. It's going to be okay."

"No it's not!" Tyler cried out. "I'm going to tell her that I'm not ready for a relationship and she's going to laugh at me and never want to see me again!"

"You've been saying that all day. You're psyching yourself out. Everything is going to be okay," Josh reassured. He spoke with a soft voice, trying to calm Tyler down doing what he knew worked best.

Tyler collapsed on the bed next to Josh and buried his face into his pillow. He liked Jenna, he really really did, and he wanted to have something with her, but he didn't think he was ready for that. His past relationship[s hadn't helped much either. People didn't seem to care too much about the long term effects of emotional abuse. Tyler was still scared to trust people, to get close to them on that level, to accept his feelings for them.

Tyler's phone went off.

"It's almost seven. Do you want me to walk with you to Jenna's building?" Josh asked.

Tyler sat up and slowly shook his head. The headache he had gotten from all of this thoughts was still pounding loudly within his head.

"No," Tyler replied. "I should be okay."

Josh gave him small smile and walked him to the door.

"Have fun, Ty," Josh called out as Tyler walked down the hallway. "Everything will be okay!"

Tyler hunched hos shoulders as he walked down the empty sidewalk. It was cold, but Tyler liked the cold. It always managed to make him feel alive no matter how dead he felt inside.

"Everything will be okay," Tyler repeated Josh's words to himself. "Everything will be okay."

When Tyler finally made it to Jenna's door, he paused. His fist was raised and ready to knock, but his heart was pounding too fast for him to concentrate on bringing his knuckles to the wood. Eventually though, he managed.

"Hey," Jenna smiled as she stepped out into the hallways of her dorm building.

"Hey," Tyler replied.

Jenna's hair was curled to frame her face perfectly and the way the light caught her eyes made Tyler have to convince himself that yes, this was real life.

They walked side by side to the restaurant that wasn't far from campus. Neither made an attempt to hold the other's hand. The air surrounding them wasn't awkward or uncomfortable, but rather inviting and friendly.

They sat through the meal laughing with each other and exchanged stories, talking on a deeper level than they ever had before. Neither feel pressured into sharing something, and for once Tyler felt comfortable out in public laughing too loud and smiling too much. With Jenna his insecurities seemed to be nonexistent. She made him feel safe.

After the bill had come and they had paid, they made their way out onto the patio that over looked a small stream at the back of the restaurant. They stood close to each other as it had gotten colder since they first arrived.

"So you said you had something important to tell me," Tyler spoke up. Jenna nodded her head slowly. "I have something important to tell you as well."

Jenna's eyebrows raised up a bit and Tyler could see something along the look of panic cross her face. Tyler took a deep breath.

"Jenna," he started. "I really like you, like a lot, but I don't think that, what I'm saying is, I can't..."

Jenna reached out and put a hand on his shoulder.

"Take your time," she whispered.

Tyler smiled softly before he continued. "I don't think I', quite ready to have a relationship, and I don't know how you feel about it all, but I didn't want to seem like I was leading you on or anything."

Suddenly Jenna breathed a sigh of relief.

"I was thinking the same thing, and I didn't know how to tell you," she admitted. "I like you a whole lot, too, but things have been so crazy lately and I'm not sure I could handle a relationship just yet."

Tyler smiled. "So we're on the same page then?"

"Looks like it."

Tyler sighed and buried his face in his hands. "Oh, thank God. I was worried you were going to hate me or something."

Jenna laughed. "That's impossible. I could never, even in a million years, hate you."

Tyler didn't know if it was possible for a heart to smile, but he was pretty sure he just found out what it would feel like.


	25. Final Moments

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so there are some mentions in this chapter about another story that I've written and posted on my wattpad account (bulletproof-daydream)

The air outside was colder than it had been all year. The threat of a cold drifted down hallways, where the occasional cough and sniffle could be heard behind the closed doors. The library was full to the brim of people reading and typing furiously away at their laptops, yet no soul uttered a word. The cafeteria was serving more "home cooked" meals, and if one was quiet enough, they would be able to hear the distant sounds of muffled crying.

Finals week was on the horizon and no one was prepared for the amount of stress that came along in the form of a tidal wave.

With a heavy sigh, Tyler let his textbook fall to the floor. His notes from the lecture didn't make any sense and the book wasn't helping. He sat up and brushed away the half empty packet of poptarts and two empty energy drinks. It had been all he had eaten all weekend, but Tyler had gone longer with even less food, so he figured he would be alright.

Tyler rubbed his eyes as he walked towards his door. He hadn't seen Josh in about two days due to all of the last minute studying.

"Josh?" Tyler called out when he reached his friends door. He knew it was unlocked but out of courtesy he still knocked.

"Who is it?" came Josh's strained reply.

Tyler knitted his eyebrows together. He was sure that Josh knew his voice by now. He was also sure the Josh's voice sounded like he had been crying.

"It's Tyler. Can I come in?"

A few seconds of silence passed.

"Yeah. But only you. No one else."

Tyler frowned even more and pushed open the door. Josh was seated on his bed with his blanket around his shoulders. His cheeks were bright pink, almost matching his quickly fading hair, and his eyes were blood shot. His entire body was shaking and his breathing was ragged. Tyler stepped forward, a guess as to what was going on already forming inside of his head.

"Are you okay?" Tyler asked as softly as he could.

Josh's eyes darted around his room and his fingers twitched at his sides.

"What makes you think I'm not okay? I'm fucking dandy right now," Josh said with a humorless laugh. A lone tear slipped down his face.

"Josh," Tyler replied. "You're crying. What's up?"

Josh shook his head. Tyler didn't know if that meant he didn't want to talk or if he was just trying to rid his mind of some vile thought. Tyler often did that.

"I've never been good at handling stress," Josh said after a while. "I told you what I used to do. Since I stopped doing that, I've gotten really bad anxiety attacks or whatever when I've felt too stressed because I'll remind myself of what I used to do and freak out, which only adds to initial feeling of panic. I don't know how to stop them."

Tyler sat down next to his friend and let Josh lean on him. He knew that when he was like this he just needed something stable to hold onto until whatever was happening had passed. Maybe Josh needed something like that, too.

"Why does this have to happen?" Josh asked Tyler.

"I don't," Tyler hesitated, "I don't know. I'm sorry."

"It's okay."

"No, it' not."

"Really, Ty. It's okay. You don't have to say anything, you know," Josh said.

"I just feel so bad that I can't think of anything to say to you. I can usually write pages upon pages of words with deep and thoughtful meaning that can make a difference in someone's life, but when it comes to the things that really matter to me, like helping you, I can't say anything," Tyler said in all one breath. "I feel so bad because you're always the one helping me when I need it and when you need me I can't do anything but sit next to you."

Josh sat up from Tyler's side and looked into his eyes. Tyler's were wide and desperate, pain shooting through the brown irises, while Josh's were simultaneously calm and panicked.

Slowly, with a surprisingly strong and calm voice, Josh began to speak. "It's okay, Tyler. We're broken people. What are you going to do? Right now all I need is for someone to sit by me anyways."

Tyler gave him a small, reassuring smile. "If you're there for me, and even if you're not, I'll always be there for you."

"Right by my side?"

"Right by your side."

Josh let out a laugh. "This sounds like some cheesy sequel for a cliché love story."

"It does, doesn't it?" Tyler laughed as well.

"All we need now is to move into apartments across the hall from each other and get lost in the city and we'll be set."

Tyler smiled. "Let's make it through college first."

Eventually Josh calmed down enough to continue studying. After an hour Tyler convinced him that they both deserved a pizza, or really, the sound of their rumbling stomachs was becoming too much to handle. The walked the short distance to the on campus restaurant and ordered the largest pizzas the place served.

When they were finished with their meal they each wandered back to their own rooms to continue studying. Josh had his first final early in the morning, and Tyler had two in the afternoon which he was pretty sure was against the rules, but he wasn't about to complain.

As the night drew nearer, the thoughts in Tyler's head slowly began to mutate from those of biology to those of eventual and inevitable future. He reached for his bottle of sleeping pills, but it was empty. It was also too late to go to the store to buy more. With a racing heart beat and the desire to do  _something_ , Tyler turned off his lights, clasped his hands together under his sheets, and closed his eyes, preparing himself to battle the nightmares that were slowly creeping in.


	26. Confident Coward

The hellish week of finals was finally over, but the real nightmare was only just beginning for Tyler.

It had started with a phone call back home after his last test of the semester. His mother had sounded off the entire conversation, and Tyler understood why as soon as she broke the news. His brother had a tournament in California during the holiday break and they didn't have enough money to fly him out there as well. He would be suck on campus by himself for Christmas.

Tyler didn't quite understand why, but after he hung up and told his mom that he loved her, he cried.

He cried for what felt like hours. Maybe it was because he felt like a second thought to his family. Maybe it was because this wasn't the first time he been left out. Maybe it was because it was the tipping point to his eventual break down. Tyler didn't know the reason. All he knew at that point was pain.

The second kicker was that Josh was going home.

Josh was hesitant about the idea of leaving Tyler all on his own during break. He knew that Tyler was just putting on a mask for everyone, that he was hiding how he really felt. Josh knew that Tyler wasn't as okay as he was letting on. He had seen the bandages that adorned his friend's hips. He had herd the desperate cries in the middle of the night. He had noticed the significant drop in weight.

Eventually Tyler was able to convince Josh that he would be okay. Michael and his brother were staying on campus too, so he would have someone to be around and talk to if he needed it. Josh only agreed after deciding that he was coming home early.

The third thing that set Tyler completely on edge was the fact that the sleeping pills didn't work anymore.

He had taken them so often and depended on them so much that they were useless now. Tyler was still up at all hours, crying and thinking and shaking with fear, trying to convince himself to make it to the morning. His thoughts now swung at him like a battering ram, showing him no mercy now that the pills weren't in the way. His nightmares were back and the haunting images of being alone and being the reason that he was alone wouldn't leave.

And it was only the third day of break.

Somehow Tyler ended up in the lounge room at the end of his dorm hall. He didn't remember leaving his room or even making the decision to leave it; it just kind of happened. Now he was sitting on one of the couches, staring blankly at the TV in front of him and waiting for the time to pass or some brilliant person to come along and end it all for him.

_Alone again I see. I guess it's true that no one cares about you, Tyler Joseph._

"Go away," Tyler halfheartedly muttered.

_You can never escape me. I'm your only friend._

"That's not true. I have Josh and, and I have Mark. And Jenna!"

_Oh goodness me, how could I have forgotten them? I guess it was because_ **_none of them are here._ **

"Shut up," Tyler whispered through his tears.

_You now the only way to shut me up is to go down with me, and you're too much of a coward to choose that._

"I'm no coward," Tyler seethed. Anger was boiling up inside of him.

_Angry, are we? Are you upset with me? Or your friends and family? I'm not the one who left you all alone, now am I?_

Tyler cried out and began to sob into his hands. He couldn't take it anymore. His thoughts were turning against him; pushing back harder whenever he tried to fight them. He was his own worst enemy and he couldn't escape.

Or well, he could, actually, and that realization sparked something deep inside of him.

Tyler Joseph was no coward.

Without remembering how or when he got there, Tyler found himself standing near the edge of the bridge a few blocks from campus. The spot was popular among residents and tourists alike as most nights the bats would fly out from under the bridge at sunset. Tyler had seen some of the pictures Mark had taken of them. He thought it was beautiful

Tyler peered over the edge of the railing and gulped. He wondered if it would be far enough. He hoped he wouldn't have to find out if it wasn't.

A feeling of  _calm_  washed over Tyler, followed by a wave of  _why_.

"I'm not a coward," Tyler said quietly. He took two steps closer to the edge and sighed. A million thoughts were racing through his mind. It was all too much for him, but it also wasn't enough. The battle inside of him was raging on at full force. Inside his chest, something broke. "But I'm also not an idiot."

He took a step back and shoved his hands in his pockets. He let out a small, shaky sigh and blinked away a tear.

His feet moved on their own after that. He let them taken him down side streets and across roads. He let them walk where they wanted and lead him deeper into the city.

Tyler had never been to the place he had stopped in front of. He had walked past it once with Josh on their way to get food, but that had been during the day. Now, it was dark. Now the city was alive. Now there was no going back.

Tyler walked up to the doors and pushed them open. Immediately he was hit with a wall of smoke and sweat. Tyler's mind was yelling at him to leave, but his feet disobeyed.

Tyler waked right up to the bar and sat down. Usually he was be terrified of these kinds of situations and would never have even considered coming here, especially alone. But tonight was different. Tonight Tyler had a bit of false confidence.

"Ya old enough to be here, kid?" the guy behind the bar asked. He had a cigarette hanging out the side of his mouth and the tattoos on his knuckles were faded.

Tyler shook his head.

The man shrugged and set glass down in front of Tyler.

"If I don't charge ya, no one can prove that you were even here," the man said quietly. "Keep quiet, kid. And don't mess with the guys over at the pool table. They ain't looking for no game of pool.''

Tyler's eyes widened slightly as he caught a glimpse of the men the bartender was talking about. The smallest one was at least twice Tyler's size.

"Yes sir," Tyler mumbled.

"Good," the man rasped. "Now drink up."


	27. Lost Inn The Middle

Tyler woke up the next morning with a hangover. His first hangover ever, to be exact.

_Drink to forget, right? What a great idea that was. It didn’t even work._

_I know you remember everything._

Tyler groaned as he sat up and stumbled to his bathroom. He turned on the shower and jumped under the cold spray. He didn’t even care that the water was freezing. He didn’t care that his hips were burning from still unhealed wounds. He didn’t care that his head was screaming out in protest. He didn’t care.

“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” Tyler muttered under his breath. “I’m so stupid.”

_Took you long enough. Everyone else already knew that._

Tyler rubbed his hands over his face. His eyes burned from the shampoo he had forgotten he still had in his hands.

Half an hour later, Tyler stepped out of the shower, only to remember that he never actually used the soap.

“I’ll do it later,” he said.

In a half dream, half nightmare like state, Tyler hurried around his room, shoving random bits of clothing and toiletries into his empty backpack as he did so. He threw away whatever food was left in his fridge and took out the trash. After unplugging all the unnecessary things from the outlets, Tyler turned off his lights and locked his door.

“Hey, Ty,” Michael called out as Tyler made his way through the living area. He was sitting next to his brother, who was bent over a sketch book and clutching a pen in his hand so tight his knuckles were turning white. Michael’s lazy smile turned into a frown as soon as he saw the troubled look on Tyler’s face and the bag in his hands. “Where you off to?”

“Don’t know,” was Tyler’s short reply. He sounded quiet and far off. Like he wasn’t all there.

“Well, how long are you going to be gone?”

Tyler shrugged.

Michael’s frown deepened. “You okay?”

Tyler shook his head.

Michael turned and shared a look with his older brother. Gerard, or Jared, Tyler wasn’t too sure of his name, gave Michael a small, knowing nod and turned back to his sketch.

“You’ll call someone if anything happens, right?” Michael asked.

Tyler nodded.

“Be safe.”

Tyler nodded again and dazedly turned towards the door before he started walking to where his car was parked. The walk wasn’t very long, but it was long enough for Tyler to manage to get lost in his strange state of mind. It took him a while to get situated in his car and find the emergency energy drink he kept in the glove compartment. After he drank the last drop, he started the car and pulled out of the parking lot. His mother had always told him not to drive while he wasn’t emotionally stable, but another one of her sayings was that desperate time called for desperate measures, and boy was Tyler desperate.

The scenery passed by Tyler in a blur. The voices floating around in his head blended together like the tress outside the car windows. Tyler’s music was blaring so loud in an attempt to block everything out. He was pretty sure that he and the cars that drove past him on the road were just about deaf.

_You’re an idiot she never could like it was all a lie he doesn’t care about you’re just looking for attention you don’t have anything to be sad **why can’t I be normal**?_

Tyler pulled into the shoulder of the highway to catch his breath.

“I can’t get a break,” Tyler cried. “All day, worse at night. Why can’t it just stop?”

He wiped his nose on his sleeve, which caused the fabric to move up on his arm slightly. His eyes caught a glance of the marks that now littered his wrists. He had always promised himself that he wouldn’t do that. That he would never go that far, but it seems that lately he was breaking all of his promises.

_What is the point of living anymore if I’m so broken?_

“I would give anything for it all just to stop. I want to look in the mirror and be okay with who I am. Not even happy! Just okay,” Tyler whispered. “I just want to be okay.”

Hours passed, dragging by like a small child trying to pull a wrecking ball across the desert. It was physically painful. Tyler had stopped only twice during the endless minutes he had spent flying down the highway. Once to buy a pack of more energy drinks and another to restock.

The sun had set about an hour before Tyler finally pulled into the parking lot of his destination, which increased the amount of times he looked over his shoulder tenfold. He couldn’t handle it all; the paranoia, the anxiety, the stress, the _wrong wrong wrong go back home_.

“I don’t know if I have a home,” Tyler whispered quietly to himself as he stood outside the doors to the Forest Inn.

The inn had become an in-between place for Tyler. It was almost perfectly halfway between his parent’s house and the city he went to college in. It was between the pressure and the stress. The forced laughs and hiding away. It was between being dependent and completely alone. It was where Tyler actually felt comfortable. It was, for right now, where he belonged. Where he was _okay_.

The lady behind the counter was different from the one Tyler had met the two previous times. This lady was older, with grey hair and sad blue eyes. She looked as if she knew every secret to the universe.

“You look lost,” the lady spoke. Her voice was soft and calming, like a hug that Tyler so desperately needed at the moment.

“I’m not lo-,”

“Not in the literal meaning of the word,” she interrupted him. Tyler knitted his eyebrows together. The lady looked down and typed something into the computer, silently getting Tyler’s room in order and handing him the paper to sign. After she handed him his key, she took a deep breath and began to speak again.

“Down in the forest,” she spoke, “if you walk in deep enough, there’s a river. A tree branch hangs over it at just the right height so you can dangle your feet in the water. It’s a great place to go and think.”

Tyler stood in his spot, looking at the little old lady in front of him. How she knew exactly what he needed, he didn’t know. It was probably just written all over his face.

“Get some good rest. Breakfast is at eight.”

Tyler nodded slowly and turned down the hallway that led to the staircase. Each step he took felt like some sort of weight was being lifted off his shoulders. Maybe it was because he wasn’t home and he wasn’t too far away. Maybe it was because he finally found the balance he needed.

Maybe it was because the energy drinks were finally wearing off and he was struggling to keep his eyes open.


	28. Cold Shoulders

It was four in the morning on the day after Christmas. The frost had swept over the small town during the past few nights, covering everything in a thin layer of ice and freezing over some areas of the creek that ran through the woods. Tyler was sitting on the tree branch that hung over the water methodically tapping his toes against the ice. Every now and then a small piece would break off and Tyler would watch it float down the small stream until his eyes could no longer chase it in the dark.

What is loneliness? Does everyone feel lonely? It is just a social construct made up for the sole purpose of companies making money off of couples and groups of friends? Why does one feel lonely? Is it the absence of people in one’s immediate reach? Is it not having people to be completely honest with? Is it the overbearing company of one’s thoughts?

Tyler’s phone began to ring. A distant melody clashing with the harsh stillness of Tyler’s surroundings.

“Tyler, why aren’t you at campus?” Josh’s ragged voice was like a slap in the face.

Tyler didn’t reply immediately. He hadn’t talked to anyone besides himself since he fled his school and found refuge at the inn.

“Because,” he eventually mumbled.

“Because?” Josh repeated, annoyance clear in his tone of voice. Tyler flinched at the word. “Tyler, I’m worried about you. Michael said that you left and hadn’t called him to let him know how you were. You didn’t tell your family you were leaving; you didn’t even tell me, for crying out loud!”

Tyler hung his head as he listened to Josh sigh on the other end of the phone. He didn’t want to worry Josh; it was the last thing he wanted. He just needed sometime alone to think about everything without anyone else around to question him. He asked himself enough questions as it was. Tyler needed more answers.

“Ty, what’s going on? You’ve been acting even more differently lately. I’ve noticed the bandages, the energy drinks, the bottles of pills. Michael even said he thought you came back drunk the other night! You’re not okay!”

“Leave me alone, Josh,” Tyler whispered. He didn’t want to be to his best friend, but right now he needed to be alone. Alone was good sometimes.

“I’m not going to leave you alone!” Josh shouted. Tyler pulled the phone away from his ear and winced. He was hurting Josh. “I need you to tell me what’s going on with you. You’re hurting yourself and I’m not going to stand by and watch anymore. I’m done with it.”

“Josh, I need to do this by myself.”

“By yourself?” Josh laughed. “You’ve been by yourself for this long and you’ve only gotten worse. I can’t let you do this alone.”

 A voice in the background hissed at Josh to be quiet.

_Josh is still with his family. You’re taking up the time he’s supposed to be spending with them._

“Shut up,” Tyler said to his own thoughts.

“I will not shut up!” Josh seethed. “Tyler, this is serious. It’s been serious. You need real help.”

Tyler blinked away a tear for upsetting Josh to the point of yelling, and then another for allowing himself to cry yet again.

“You have to understand,” Tyler pleaded. “Leave me alone.”

Josh sighed again. “Leave you alone? Is that what you really want?”

Tyler nodded. “Yes. Please.”

“Fine, you know what? I won’t say another word to you then,” Josh said, venom dripping from each syllable. “Merry Christmas, Tyler Joseph.”

The line went dead. Tyler choked back a sob and set his phone down in the branch beside. Him.

“I want you to be here. I want your help,” he cried. “But I can’t. I’m just a waste. You need to see that, Josh.”

Tyler spent the remainder of the morning and art of the afternoon sitting on the branch. The ice that he had been tapping his toes against was all chipped away, letting him see how the water underneath flowed freely. Once or ten times Tyler’s stomach growled, but he was so used to ignoring the pain that accompanied not eating that he didn’t take much notice. His thoughts were focused on the fact that Josh probably hated him now.

He probably hated him because he took up space. Because he took up time and energy. Because he meant nothing and was going nowhere. Because he was an awful friend.

It was half past three by the time Tyler made himself walk all the way back to the inn. His thoughts had picked him clean; leaving behind nothing but a sorry excuse of a boy and a broken heart.

When Tyler reached the inn he passed by the front counter on the way to his room. The old lady from the other night was back but this time she was on the phone. Tyler paid little attention to her as he passed, that is, until he heard something that sparked his interest.

“No, sir, he hasn’t been in all day. Spends most of his time in the forest, oh wait, actually he just walked in.”

Tyler’s face twisted into a look of confusion as he entered his room. Who would call in regards to him? Unless some other guy spent his entire time in the forest and walked in right at the same moment Tyler had.

 _It’s probably the second one,_ Tyler thought. _No one cares enough about me._

As soon as his door was closed, Tyler collapsed onto the bed. He hadn’t slept since around the beginning of Christmas Eve. Part of it was due to his returning nightmares that he didn’t want to face, and the other part was because his thoughts were now at a constant state of yelling everything at him. Even the normal thoughts that caused no harm were screaming into his ears all throughout the day.

“Alone,” Tyler mumbled as his eyes slipped shut. “I’m alone.”


	29. Absent Conversations

It was hard for Tyler to sleep the next few nights. He had caught look of himself in the mirror, something which he had avoided doing since he left campus. He was in dire need of a haircut and shave, along with shower that actually involved using soap. He had been so consumed in his own thoughts that he neglected to remember to stop by the front counter to ask for more shampoo.

Along with hair, more lines had appeared on Tyler’s face, effectively adding on at least five to ten more years of age. He was a child lost in a grown man’s body, fending for himself in a world he wasn’t ready to conquer. His clothes hung off his now bony shoulders and his tan from the summer had faded, leaving him with a sickly pale glow. His knuckles were dry and cracked from the hours he had spent outside in the forest and his stomach had all but caved in on itself due to a lack of proper meals.

When he finally made his way back to campus, hardly anyone could recognize him.

The walk through the living room area in his dorm hall was excruciating. Each step added on ten pounds to his shoulders and the carpet felt like quick sand. Every single eye was on him as he walked the sort distance out of the room and into the hall. Tyler had never before felt so judged.

Out of the corner of his eyes he saw Josh sitting stiffly on the edge of his seat; eyes wide with worry and fists clenched so tight his knuckles were turning white. It seemed as if Josh wanted to jump up and run towards Tyler, perhaps enveloping his best friend in a hug, but Tyler knew that Josh was still mad at him. Tyler was still mad at Tyler.

In the safety of his own room, Tyler fell onto the floor. He couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. He had been okay for the entire drive back, but the feeling in the back of his throat, where he felt like he was being chocked by invisible hands, had been present the entire time.

Eventually his tears dried and Tyler pulled himself off the floor and into his bathroom. He welcomed the warm spray of the shower and stood for what seemed like forever letting the small droplets roll down his face. It gave the same effect as crying to Tyler. He didn’t know why, but he liked it.

“Why are you so pathetic?” Tyler asked his reflection. He turned away from the mirror, unable to stand the way he looked any longer.

He redressed his wounds from previous nights and attempted to wash away the dark bags that found home under his eyes. He was a mess, and he knew it.

When he finally returned to his room, Tyler found a small cup of soup sitting on his desk with a plastic spoon sitting next to it. The cup only had maybe a few sips inside, but it was more food than Tyler had had in the past two days. Initially Tyler planned to ignore it and dump it down the sink later, but the smell had filled his room, catching the attention of his empty stomach.

It took a while for Tyler to get it all down, even though it was only a small amount, and by the end he felt a little sick, but he kept it down. A feeling of accomplishment and pride boiled up inside Tyler.

“I did it,” he whispered. “It wasn’t much, but I did it.”

He set the cup and the spoon back on his desk where he found them and went to bed questioning who had left the small cup of food. He couldn’t think of anyone who knew he didn’t usually eat and would care and worry about him enough to go out of their way and leave him a little something. Everyone he cared about on some level didn’t care about him back. He could only reason that a friend would do such a thing, but Tyler didn’t have any friends anymore.

He had ruined any chances with one.

Tyler woke up just before noon the next day. His head was spinning a little and his stomach felt like it had been flipped upside down, repeatedly, throughout the night. The cup and spoon that he had put back on his desk were gone, leaving Tyler to wonder if it was all just a vivid hallucination due to his consistent lack of sleep.

He had a text from Jenna stating that she had heard that he was back. She wanted to go see a movie with him. He politely declined, saying that traveling took a lot out of him and he felt a bit under the weather. It wasn’t a lie, but it wasn’t the full truth. The full truth was that he was scared.

He was scared to get close to people. He always sort of had been, but now it was worse than ever. The first person he had gotten close to in a long time was now down the hall from him, mostly likely hating his very existence. Tyler didn’t blame him. He hated himself, too.

He was scared that one tiny little thing would slip, that some way, somehow, Jenna would find out one little thing and completely disown him as her friend. He wanted to hang out with more than anything, but he didn’t want to lose her, and that terrified him.

Now, of course, Tyler knew that all of his fears were made up. He knew that Jenna would never leave his side. He knew she would try and help to the best of her ability. He knew all of that, but that’s the thing about mental illnesses such as the ones he had. They twisted and distorted his view on life and thought up terrifying and unrealistic realities. You could spend years telling and trying to convince a child that there were no sharks in the sink, and no matter how much that made sense to them, they would still be petrified to simply turn on the faucet, let alone wash their hands.

Tyler left his room a little while later with nothing more than a light jacket protecting him from the cold. He didn’t mind it too much, as he had gotten quite used o it from sitting for hours upon hours in it down in the forest, but he could still feel it. In a way, it made him feel alive, something that had been lacking in his life recently.

Tyler found himself back at the bench his feet always managed to lead him to. It was the place where he had his first nonviolent interaction with Jenna. It was the place where thoughts swam around in his head, feeding poison to his brain and convincing him to do things he never would have otherwise imagined. It wasn’t the best place for him to go, but for some reason it felt safe.

“I don’t know,” Tyler said. He could see his breath when he spoke. As a child he always imagined that he was a dragon. He’d race around his back yard with his brothers and sister, laughing for the sake of having fun and squealing every time another would get hit with a snowball.

Tyler missed those days of innocence. Where he could sit in his mother’s lap and read a book with her and not have to worry about what was going to happen the next day or in an hour. Where other people planned out his day and dictated his every move. Where people told him what was right and wrong and made sure that he was doing what he needed to be doing. Sure, it was kind of like a prison, but Tyler liked to think of it as a well-oiled machine to success, and now apparently, depression.

When Tyler got back to his room, he noticed that the door was slightly ajar. He looked around the hall, but no one was moving and no door was swinging shut behind anyone. Tyler was alone.

Tyler went to bed immediately that night, not even bothering to change out of his clothes. He didn’t even notice the granola bar that was set in the middle of his desk, nor the full box from which the granola bar came that was sitting in the bottom of his closet.

He also didn’t notice the when his door opened slightly and then closed a second later, and the small, sad sigh that escaped someone’s lips as they walked down the hall back to their own room.


	30. Nothing

The next few weeks saw little of Tyler, save for the times he had to leave for class. He woke up late and went to bed early, under eating and over sleeping to the point where he looked like how he felt: a ghost. He hardly spoke, and when he did, his throat was always dry and he sounded as if he was on the edge of tears. Speech was the hardest class for him. The social anxiety mixed with the dozens of pairs of eyes made for the perfect cocktail of crippling embarrassment and sweaty palms.

He still didn’t know anything. The ever present sadness and dark thoughts and screaming voices in his head had no reason to be there. Tyler had been brought up in a happy family on a happy street in a happy neighborhood. He had fantastically nice friends and the most amazing opportunities as a kid. Sure, he felt a little pressured by the “competition” presented by the kids at his school, and even in his own home, but everything was fine. It was great. The depression that plagued his mind had no reason to be there, or so Tyler thought.

 _You don’t deserve to be this sad,_ his mind would chant.  _You’re fine. Others have it worse._

Tyler would sigh and fight against the pain in his chest at those thoughts. It was too much for him to handle on his own. It was too much to think about when he was by himself. It was too much to talk to anybody about. It was all too much too much  _too much **too much**_.

It was times like these, when Tyler was sitting alone in his room, covered in darkness and dry tears, that all Tyler wanted was for Josh to walk through his door and tell him that everything was going to be okay. To tell him that he’s not okay now, but that he will be. That he will be right next to Tyler until he can walk alone without shaking. To tell him that he doesn’t hate him and to tell him he cares so much. Tyler just wanted his friend back.

Little did he know that that was what Josh wanted, too.

It had been over a month since the two said anything together. Each passing day where Tyler locked himself away, cutting off all communication with the ones he knew, hurt Josh more and more. He missed Tyler’s smile and the way he would laugh at all the lame jokes that Josh told. He missed the way they would just leave and do something whenever they felt like it. He missed talk to Tyler, whether it be about something deep and poetic, or something as simple as their favorite Yoshi color.

All Josh wanted to do was go up to Tyler and tell him that he didn’t hate him. He wanted to tell him that he cared so much. To tell him that he’s still right by his side and that he’ll stick with him until Tyler can walk alone. To tell him that it’s going to be okay eventually. To give him a hug.

Josh just didn’t know how to do any of that without hurting his friend. The only thing he could think of to do was sneak in and leave snacks on Tyler’s desk whenever he could just so that Tyler didn’t accidentally starve himself to death. It wasn’t much, but it was all he could do.

“Hey, man,” Michael said to Josh as he joined him on the couch in the living room. “You okay?”

Josh shook his previous thoughts from his head and looked up. Slowly, he shook he head.

“I’m sorry. Maybe you should try talking to him?” Michael suggested. Josh grimaced. “I know you’re scared to, but my brother went through stuff like this. I went through stuff like this. And the one thing I learned was that you can’t be scared to go and ask them if the need help, because chances are they’re scared enough for everyone. You have to be the brave one, even if it’s terrifying.”

Josh looked up at Michael with big, sad, empty eyes. He knew Michael was right, but he still couldn’t bring himself to do anything. The last thing he wanted was to hurt Tyler more.

Just as Josh was about to reply to Michael, a new shadow fell on the ground near the doorway.

“Tyler?” Josh whispered. The sudden appearance of his best friend in the lounge was a surprise to Josh and everyone else in the room. Conversations stopped and heads turned.

Tyler offered a weak small and a small wave in return.

Happy, yet confused, Josh smiled back and motioned for Tyler to join him on the couch. Previous conversations continued, but they were hushed and hurried, as if they were scared that loud voices would drive Tyler away. Not everyone knew what was going on with Tyler, but they knew enough to be careful.

“H-how are you?” Josh asked hesitantly.

Tyler slowly nodded his head. “Alright.”

“Good. I’m glad.”

The two fell into a slightly awkward, slightly comfortable silence. The unspoken words and still unaccepted feelings hung in the air, making it hard to breathe. Hands twitched at sides, itching to wrap around the other in a hug and thoughts screamed in minds, telling them  _no, not just yet_. It was close to torture for the two of them.

Eventually a conversation began to flow between Tyler and Josh. It was only surface topics, such as how classes were going and the latest video games, but it was more than they had talked in weeks. It felt nice. It felt comfortable. It felt right.

They talked into the night, never going into a deeper topics but not really caring. Tyler was just happy that Josh didn’t hate him, and never really had, and Josh was beyond proud that Tyler had the motivation to leave his room and be social. It was a little out of character for Tyler, and Josh was still confused about it all, but he just figured that Tyler finally found what he was looking for and accepted the fact that he wasn’t okay and was trying to get better.

Two hours later, Tyler sat down on his bed. The only light in his room came from his desk lamp and the small sliver of light that seeped in from under his door. The quite sound of Ryan playing his guitar next door filled the room with a light, happy melody. Tyler smiled.

In his left hand, Tyler held a folded piece of paper filled with scratched out lines and shaky handwriting. In his right he held a small plastic bottle. Both hands were shaking.

The smile that graced his lips faded, replaced with a slight frown. He didn’t feel happy, yet he wasn’t sad. He was in a weird in-between state. He felt neutral to everything around him. Nothing mattered and he didn’t care anymore. He was finally at peace.

Tyler set the paper on his desk and slowly opened up the bottle.

The room began to spin and his stomach and throat burned. His skin was on fire and his brain felt like it was being crushed. Everything was suddenly pain  _pain pain pain **pain**._

Then it was numb.

A door opened and slammed closed.

Footsteps pounded against the ground.

Another door was opened.

Screaming filled the air.

Something touched Tyler’s hand.

Two more voices filled the room.

Everything became nothing.


	31. Voices

**_You should have taken one more. Two more. Three more. All of them._ **

_I’m so glad you stopped when you did._

**_You shouldn’t be here._ **

_I’m so grateful that you’re still around._

**_That could have been it. The end. Never again._ **

_This is the start. A new beginning. You can try again._

**_No one wanted you to wake up._ **

_Everyone is so happy to see you._

**_It’s just going to get even worse._ **

_You can get help now. You can get better._

**_They’re all crying because of you. This is all your fault._ **

_No one blames you._

**_You’re broken. You’re sick. No one gives a shit about you._ **

_Everyone cares so, so much._

**_You don’t mean anything._ **

_Without you things would be so different._

**_You’re worthless._ **

_People would miss you._

**_You make up all your problems._ **

_You have every right to be sad._

**_It’s not even real. You’re faking everything. People have it worse than you._ **

_Mental illnesses are as real and as serious as physical ones._

**_You’re just being selfish._ **

_You’re trying your best._

**_You best isn’t good enough. It never will be._ **

_You can make it so far. You’re going to do great things._

**_You’re a failure. Your family is ashamed of you._ **

_Everyone is so proud of what you’ve done and where you are._

**_You’re destined for a life of loneliness and sadness._ **

_You deserve so much._

**_You are nothing._ **

_You are something._

**_You are nothing._ **

_You are nothing nothing **nothing nothing nothing.**_


	32. The Start

“Tyler Joseph!” Mrs. Joseph screamed into Tyler’s ear through the phone. “How could you be so careless like that! You never leave medicine around yourself when you’re feeling off for that reason exactly! You’ll forget how much you’ve taken and then end up in the hospital again!”

Tyler solemnly nodded his head. “I know. I’m sorry, Mom.”

“And to think that I’m trusting you to live on your own!” she continued. “I raised you better than this. You’re a smart boy, Tyler. But you have to remember that you can’t do everything on your own.”

“Yes, Mom.”

“Next time you’re sick ask Josh to give your medicine and to keep the rest away from you. We don’t need another scare like that,” Mrs. Joseph cried. “Your father was just about ready to drive down there and bring you home himself!”

From the other side of the line, Tyler could hear his father yell out from the background. “No I wasn’t! That was all you. He’s fine is what I said.”

Tyler half smiled. His parents never changed. Sometimes he missed that.

“I’ll have Josh do it, don’t worry, Mom,” Tyler sighed.

“Oh, you know I will always worry about you, Tyler. You’re my baby boy,” his mother huffed. “Also, next time, will you call us yourself? From your own phone? It near gave me a heart attack when Josh called from the phone at the hospital yesterday.”

“Can do, Mom. I love you.”

“I love you, too, sweetie,” she sighed. “I’ll talk to you later though, to check up on you. You father and I have to go to your brother’s basketball game.”

Tyler flinched at her last few words. He loved his brother, he loved him so much, and he loved his parents too, but it felt like his parents cared about him a little less than everyone else.

“Talk to you later, Mom.”

“Bye, sweetie.”

The line went dead and Tyler hand dropped into his lap. He looked up at Josh who had been leaning against Tyler’s desk in the corner the whole time. Josh was worried. Tyler could tell.

“You,” Tyler started to say. “You didn’t tell her that I tried to... that it was an… a uh….”

“Attempt?” Josh suggested. “No. I know you don’t want them to know. I said you were sick and just took too many pills because you lost count and couldn’t remember.”

Tyler looked back down at his lap and nodded his head.

“Thank you,” Tyler whispered.

Josh didn’t say anything but moved away from the desk and sat down next to Tyler. He put his arms around his way too thin best friend and gave him a hug.

“Please,” Josh said. “Please don’t ever do that to me again.”

Tyler could tell that Josh was crying. He turned his upper body so that he could hug Josh back. When he did so he became very aware of how much smaller he was than Josh. At the start of the year, they had been about the same. Now, Tyler was next to nothing.

“I know I’m being selfish, but, Ty, please don’t ever make me go through that with you again.”

Josh entire body was shaking. Guilt flooded through Tyler and squeezed his heart, making his chest hurt even more.

“I’m sorry,” Tyler eventually choked out.

Josh only hugged him tighter.

“I’ll let you get some rest, okay?” Josh said after he wiped away the last of his tears. Tyler nodded, unable to trust his voice. Something inside of him was on the edge of breaking and he didn’t know what was going to set it off. “I’m right down the hall. Come get me if you need me.”

Tyler nodded again.

Slowly Josh got up and made his way out of Tyler’ room. In the distance a door closed, and that was the last thing Tyler heard before complete silence.

Tyler sat on the edge of his bed, hands gripping the sheets tightly for no reason other than to feel grounded. He looked around his room. Almost everything that could be used as a weapon or cause any kind of harm had been removed. It made Tyler feel weird.

Thoughts ran laps around his brain, asking questions as soon as he had figured out an answer. It was all too much for him to handle, reminding him of all those other times he had used an escape. His forearms burned and his fingers twitched, but he never let go of his sheets. He didn’t know if it was because he was being strong or if it was out of the fear of what else might happen if he couldn’t control himself.

Eventually Tyler got up and walked into his bathroom. As soon as his door was closed he rested his back against it. His mind was racing faster, becoming louder, lashing out. _Too much_.

_You’re a coward_ , his mind whispered.

“Coward,” Tyler repeated.

_You’re no good._

“No good.”

_You can’t even kill yourself. You’re a failure._

“Failure.”

_And now everyone is stuck with you._

Tyler’s hands began shaking and his legs felt like they were going to give out it any moment.

_You’re weak, pathetic, worthless, stupid, inadequate…_

Tyler was on the edge of tears.

_You know it’s all true._

With tears streaming down his face, Tyler moved away from his bathroom door looked into his mirror. There were dark bags under his eyes from the many nights he hadn’t been able to fall asleep and his hair was longer than it had ever been, falling lifelessly against his forehead. The skin on his face, and once he stepped back, every inch of the skin that covered his body, was a sickly pale and he could see some of his bones poking out at awkward angles.

He grimaced at his appearance and rested his hands on the bathroom counter, letting his head fall forward and his tears land in the sink. His shoulders shook as he cried, becoming even more upset at the fact that he was crying in the first place.

“Worthless,” he muttered to himself. He blinked away more tears and raised his head to stare angrily back at his reflection.

“Fucking worthless,” he said again, this time with venom dripping off of each syllable.

He suddenly turned away from the mirror, as if to leave the bathroom, but swung back around immediately. A mangled scream escaped from his mouth as his fist collided with the mirror. It broke on contact and thousands of tiny shards fell away from the wall.

Tyler left his hand against the wall, panting and shaking from all of the adrenaline running through his body. When he pulled his hand back, all he could do was stare at the way his blood was dripping into the sink. He was so mesmerized by the sight that he didn’t hear the sound of a door opening and slamming shut and a pair of feet worriedly rushing down the hall.

A loud knock on the door tore Tyler’s eyes away from the mirror.

“Tyler?” cried a worried voice. It was Josh. Why was Josh there? “Tyler, was that you?”

There was more knocking at the door as Tyler dazedly moved towards it.

“Please, Tyler, open up!”

Tyler rested his forehead against the door. His hand was throbbing with pain, making it hard to concentrate on anything else.

“Leave me alone,” Tyler whimpered.

The doorknob to his room jiggled. It was actually locked for once, which only heightened Josh’s level of worry. Tyler didn’t remember locking it.

“Please, Tyler!” he cried. “What happened? Why is your door locked?”

Tyler didn’t say anything.

“Let me in, please. I just want to help you!” Josh pleaded. “What was that loud crash?”

Tyler turned around and sat with his back against the door and his knees up.

“It was me,” Tyler whispered, barely loud enough for Josh to hear. “I punched my mirror.”

“You what? Are you okay?”

Tyler shook his head. Disappointment in himself was spreading throughout his body. “No, I’m not.”

“Let me in, then. I want to help. Please let me!” Josh’s voice was growing more desperate by the second.

“You can’t,” Tyler said solemnly. “I’m broken. You can’t fix something that’s as broken as me.”

“What are you going on about? You aren’t broken.” Josh moved around on the other side of the door so that he was seated in the hallway staring at Tyler’s door. He figured that he should give up on trying to get Tyler to open his door. The best he could do at this point is keep him in one place before he can do anything else.

“And you shouldn’t spend your time on someone as worthless as me. I’m not even a good friend,” Tyler said. Inside his chest his heart was pounding _don’t leave me alone_ while his thoughts fought back, almost making Tyler scream, as they shouted _go away leave me alone._ He wanted Josh to be right by his side, but he also wanted him to be on the other side of campus. “I don’t know what your favorite color is.”

“Ty,” Josh’s heart was breaking. Tyler thought he was worthless? “What are you going on about? What started all this? You are not worthless. Who told you that?”

Tyler shrugged. “No one had to tell me. I just know. I’m a piece of trash.”

“No,” Josh said again, tightening his grip on his friend. “Tyler don’t say that. That’s not true. Don’t even think that, okay? You are worth so much to me. I can’t even begin to describe how much you mean to me. I was petrified at the thought of losing you.”

Josh sounded so sincere and every word felt like a stab to Tyler’s heart. Josh was lying, and didn’t even know.

When Tyler remained silent, Josh continued to talk. He figured that he probably looked a little weird, what with sitting in the middle of the dorm hall talking to a door, but Tyler was much more important that other people’s perception of his sanity.

“When I see you, I see my best friend. Not some _thing_ that belongs in the garbage.” Josh’s voice was gentle and so quiet it was almost a whisper. “I see a guy who is insanely smart and absolutely hilarious. A guy who writes the sickest rhymes and loves tacos just a little too much. A guy who would be the life of any party and can always manage to make my day better. When I see you, I know I wanna hang out with you for the rest of my life because you mean so much to me and I never want to forget you or lose you. And I know that Mark and Jenna think that about you too when they see you.”

Tyler looked down at his hand. The bleeding had slowed down, but it still felt as though it had been dipped in acid. A tear fell down his cheek. Why did Josh care about him so much? Why did anyone care about him? All he did was hurt himself more and more to the point where he almost died.

 “So please, don’t call yourself worthless. Don’t think it, don’t do anything. Because you are worth so much to me.”

Tyler was silent. “But I don’t have any purpose. What good am I if I can’t figure out what I’m supposed to do with my life? I just fuck everything up.”

“What do you mean?”

Something inside of Tyler snapped. He was at his weakest and the floodgates had broken. A cascade of tears fell from his face, mixing with the blood.

“I just feel so completely worthless! I’m not good at anything and I mess everything up! I can’t even talk to my mom without upsetting her! What kind of a son am I?”

Tyler’s voice was hoarse now from all the yelling and Josh wanted nothing more than to open the door and hold his friend.

“And- And there are the voices in my head, you know? And they yell at me every day telling me that I’m useless and stupid and pathetic and a fuck up and it’s gotten to the point where I wish I was dead! But it’s not just that simple because I’m too much of a fucking coward to do anything to myself! And when I do get the courage I just fuck it all up!”

The whole dorm could hear Tyler at this point he was shouting so loud, but none of them besides Josh could make sense of the sobbing mess that Tyler had become.

“I’m a fucking worthless piece of trash that’s just waiting for the day someone takes pity on me and ends it all for good. I don’t have a purpose in life. I’m just going to end up dead.”

After waiting for Tyler’s voice to die down and his gasps to become less frequent, slowly and softly Josh began to speak. “First of all, you don’t ruin everything. If anything, you make things better. You made my life a hell of a lot better when I met you.”

“But I’m just wasting your time right now with my problems that don’t even matter.”

Josh shook his head. With every word that came out of Tyler’s mouth, Josh’s heart broke even more. To hear his best friend, the person that had stood by his side the entire year, say that was like being stabbed with a rusty blade over and over again.

“If it’s bothering you, or has anything to do with you, then yes, of course it matters. It matters a whole fucking lot because you are my best friend and _no one_ is more important to me, okay? So don’t say that anything about you doesn’t matter,” Josh said.

Tyler was shaking. He could barely control his breathing and the pain in his hand hadn’t stopped.

“Second of all, everyone has a purpose,” Josh spoke with as much sincerity as he could. He wanted Tyler to not only hear what he had to say, but to listen. “Some know what theirs’ is and some don’t. I don’t think that I’ve quite figured mine out yet, but right now it’s hitting things really hard with sticks to make sound come out and hanging out with my best friend and making sure he’s okay. Some people’s purpose is to teach others, whether in a classroom or not, some people are meant to do stupid shit on the internet, and others are meant to cook. But that doesn’t really matter. What matters is that they are all different and unique for each person. It takes time to figure that out. Some figure it out in elementary school and others figure it out when they’re eighty. You have to give it time. Everyone has a purpose.”

Tyler sniffled. “But I don’t. My thoughts will be the death of me because I have nothing to live for. I’m not good at anything but fighting with the voices in my head.”

Both were quiet and no one in the hall said a word. It was the calm after the storm, it seemed. Tyler’s hand had stopped bleeding and his breathing had evened out, and his cheeks were nearly dry, as well.

A voice inside his head was screaming at him, _don’t be fooled don’t be fooled he doesn’t care you’re worthless you’re better off dead no one cares about you_ , but something deep within Tyler’s chest was beating, shouting louder and fighting to be heard over the voice in his head. _You do matter you do matter listen to Josh you do matter you matter so much._

After minutes of nothing but silence, apart from the battle going on inside Tyler, Josh took a deep breath.

“Maybe your purpose is to defeat your demons. Or at least, maybe that’s the start of it.”


	33. Epilogue - This Is Only Chapter One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before you go on and read the rest of this, I would like to say thank you. This story was a place that I could go to let out all my emotions and pour my soul into it in hopes of helping others and showing people like me that they aren't alone. So thank you for letting me leave everything here. I hope you were able to use this as much as I was. I would also like to remind each and every person that reads this that you are special and important and your life means so much, no matter what you or anyone else says. Things will get better, and if that day isn't today, there's always going to be a tomorrow if you keep trying. I believe in you. Stay street. You can do it |-/

Tyler Joseph was the kind of person who liked to think that he was patient. He prided himself in being able to wait the full three minutes for his macaroni and cheese to heat up in the microwave, and he was always able to stay calm while waiting on his friends. The reality of it all was that he was a nervous wreck when it came to waiting for things. He was as impatient as most small children, with a leg bouncing problem and fidgeting hands to go on top.

“You okay, man?”

Tyler turned to his right. Walking through the door was the sole person who had helped Tyler make it all the way through college without any major catastrophes: Joshua Dun. Tyler was pretty sure that had he never met Josh in the first place, he wouldn’t be around to enjoy the blue skies and fresh air the later years of his life had to offer.

“Yeah,” Tyler answered as Josh sat down next to him. “Just nervous.”

Josh smiled and nodded his head. He was happy. He was happy that college was over. He was happy that he got the job he had been wanting for years, head tech at the city’s finest theatre, and he was happy that the weather had been so pleasant lately. He was happy that he and his girlfriend were still together even after she moved back home. He was happy that he still had his best friend.

The past few years hadn’t been easy, but Tyler and Josh had made it through. Together they had beaten a persistent eating disorder, gotten rid of nightmares, come out on top of two more heavy waves of depression, one other attempt at life, and had seen almost four years without any sign of new personally inflicted injuries. The two had been through hell, but they had been through it together.

“Relax, man,” Josh said to his friend. “Everyone gets nervous about this kind of stuff. It’s normal.”

There had been times where neither thought the other was going to make it through to the end of their college career. There had been health cares, both mental and physical, and many freak accidents. Josh never thought that he would have been able to overcome most of his social anxieties, and Tyler, if he was being honest, never planned to see a majority of the days that had now since passed him. They had been through so much, and now at the end of the old and the beginning of tomorrow, they were happy that each of them had stuck around.

“Remember how scared I was to talk to Angie that first time?” Josh asked. Tyler smiled and nodded his head, remembering how Josh had hid behind him in the store. “You’ll be fine. If I could do that, you can do this.”

Tyler glanced over at his friend with his eyes slightly closed, a look of disbelief on his face. “Really, Josh? Those are your great words of wisdom that you share with me on this great day? You talking to Ang is totally different than this!”

Josh smirked and shook his head, laughing a little bit as he did so. “I know, I know. Just trying to lighten the mood a bit. It’s gonna be okay, you know that.”

Tyler only smiled and shook his head.

As he sat in his spot, which was the only seat not taken up by laundry in the small two room apartment that he and Josh shared, Tyler’s left hand fiddled inside his pocket. He was nervous, but in all the right ways. Days upon weeks upon months upon years had been leading up to this point in his life. Heartbreak and hospital visits, nights spent drowning in tears and days spent laughing too hard. It had been a roller coaster, and today Tyler felt like he was finally getting off the hellish ride. He had always been a fan of heights, but sometimes it was even too much for him.

“So what’s the plan then?” Josh asked.

Tyler sighed. “I’m just gonna go with the flow. Do it when I’m ready.”

His hands twitched even more inside his pockets.

“But today’s definitely the day?”

“Today’s the day,” Tyler smiled back.

Josh watched as Tyler absentmindedly played with the small treasure he had in his pocket. He was so incredibly proud of his best friend. He had watched Tyler battle through his first year of college, and then some. Getting the apartment together had been Josh’s idea. His main purpose for getting it was so he could keep a closer eye on Tyler, although he would never say it out loud. Tyler knew that was the reason anyways. Josh just wanted him to be safe, and the apartment was the only way he could think of that didn’t involve being too over bearing.

The two sat in companionable silence for the next five minutes. The feeling of anxiousness was floating through the air, but the good kind where you know something big and exciting is going to happen but you don’t quite know when. Butterflies were eating away at Tyler’s insides, and the suspense was driving Josh over the edge.

A knock on their front door pulled them out of their deep thoughts.

“Hi,” Tyler whispered as he opened the door. In front of him was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen. The girl he had trusted his heart with. The girl he loved more than anything.

He remembered the first moment he met her. It wasn’t a meeting to be rewritten hundreds of times in romance novels, but it was special and memorable. Tyler also remember the first moment he realized that he was in love with her.

They were lying on a hammock back at her parent’s place while they were visiting over spring three years back. She had a flower in her hair that he had picked out for her and his arm was draped around her waist. He was softly humming a song while she sang the chorus. It was at the moment when she started laughing at the shapes the clouds were making that he knew he was truly happy in her presence.

“Hi,” Jenna whispered back.

Tyler turned around from the door and smiled at Josh.

“We’ll be back soon,” Tyler said.

“Nah, take your time. Have fun,” Josh replied.

Josh winked at Tyler, causing him to blush and Jenna to laugh.

Just before the door to their apartment closed, Josh caught sight of Tyler slipping his hand into his left pocket again. He knew the he was wrapping his long fingers around the small black box again. He knew he was thinking about opening it after saying those few words many had spoken before. Josh knew that Tyler was thinking about how Jenna would react when he opened it. He knew that she would love the thin silver band with the diamonds on it. He knew all of that.

 

But mostly he knew that Tyler was finally, completely happy, and that’s all he could ask for.

**Author's Note:**

> Second time ever posting something on here! This story is also up on my wattpad account but I thought I could put it here, too. I hope you like it!


End file.
